


Half Agony, Half Hope

by turtle_wexler



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Eventual Fluff, F/M, HEA this time I promise, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Minor Character Death, Murder Mystery, Mutual Pining, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Public Sex, Romance, Secret Relationship, Severus Snape Lives, Smut, but with murder, other secrets, sorta Persuasion inspired
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-13
Updated: 2021-02-21
Packaged: 2021-03-07 21:40:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 17
Words: 33,313
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26994580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/turtle_wexler/pseuds/turtle_wexler
Summary: Twenty minutes into the Order Christmas party, and Severus’s face is already between her legs.When their secret romance becomes a little less secret, things fall apart. Years later, they meet again.
Relationships: Hermione Granger/Severus Snape
Comments: 823
Kudos: 1037
Collections: Hearts and Cauldrons Discord Members





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Not sure how many chapters are going to be in this one. My outlines are forever changing. I can be found on [tumblr](https://turtlewexlerwrites.tumblr.com/) if you want to say hi.
> 
> Also, huge thanks to Morbidmuch for idea bouncing and just being amazing. 🥰 And for encouraging me to use the first line in the summary. 😏

Twenty minutes into the Order Christmas party, and Severus’s face is already between her legs.

Hermione braces her hands on the panelled door at her back, his wards tingling against her palms. She knows his magic almost as well as he knows her body. As she gasps and grips his hair, he releases a sighing moan, as if he thoroughly enjoys the maddeningly slow slide of his tongue against her. He knows how close she is. He has to.

If she asks, he will go faster, add pressure, make her come. He always fulfills the requests she whispers when they are alone, as long as she doesn’t ask him to get undressed.

Even after all they’ve done together, Severus still keeps his robes on—the same ones he used to wear to teach. At first, she liked the roughness of wool rubbing against her thighs as he thrust into her. It felt illicit, forbidden. Like he was still her professor.

Now, she longs to see him stripped bare. Severus crooks his fingers inside of her, and she imagines unfastening that long row of buttons. He makes another sighing moan, and she pretends she can feel the heat of his naked skin against hers. Another flick of his tongue and the rising wave of pleasure within her bursts, pulsing outward.

Standing, Severus crushes his mouth to hers. Her hands map out what she can feel of him through his robes: the width of his shoulders, the curve of his waist, the hardness of his cock. She knows his body, too, even if she hasn’t seen him naked. She knows what he likes. If she drops to her knees, she knows she can turn him into the one who is gasping, quivering, begging.

“I want to fuck you,” he says against her lips. “Get on the bed.”

She obeys. She always does. They are in the bedroom she used to share with Ginny when they stayed at Grimmauld Place, and it hasn’t changed at all. Same peeling brown wallpaper, same creaky single beds, same aura of 1975. The springs on one of the beds give an almighty protest as she crawls into the middle of the mattress on her hands and knees. Severus is behind her in the next instant, lifting her skirt, rubbing a hand over her hip, dropping a kiss to the centre of her back.

“Yes?” he asks.

Arousal always turns him taciturn, sharpens the edge of his voice. Often, it’s just one word at a time. _Kneel. Yes. Fuck. Hermione._

Hermione looks at him over her shoulder. He has his trousers unfastened, one hand wrapped around his cock, idly stroking up and down as he stares at her. She is tempted to roll onto her back and let herself enjoy that sight for a while, but she is too impatient. She needs to feel him inside her.

“Yes,” she says.

A sigh falls from his lips. He enters her slowly, inch by inch, pausing to savour the moment he fills her completely.

“Severus,” she says when he doesn’t move.

His breathy chuckle tickles the back of her neck. When this thing— _whatever_ it is—between them first started, he was touch starved. He used to grip her hips, holding her still as she rode him, afraid he would come too quickly. Now, he stops moving to torture her. If asked, he will say it’s to draw out her pleasure, but she knows better. He’s getting even for every time she squirmed in his lap, every time she whispered, “Just let go. I want to make you come.”

Finally, he draws out slowly and slams back in. He circles her clit with deft fingers, his cock hitting the perfect spot with every thrust. His other hand tangles in her hair, pulling just hard enough. It doesn’t take long before it’s all too much. That top-of-the-roller-coaster stomach drop is the only warning she gets before she’s clenching around him, calling out his name.

There is a certain moan Severus makes when he comes—a soft gasp followed by a long groan. Hermione grins into the duvet at the sound. If they wouldn’t be missed, she could hide in this room all night, making him moan like that again and again.

She lets out a murmur of protest as he pulls out of her, but the way he reclines on the bed and smiles at her makes up for it. Something about the unguarded warmth of that smile makes her feel as if it’s something she isn’t supposed to witness. Like she’s Psyche, stealing a glimpse of Cupid.

“Severus?” she says, kissing his clothed shoulder when he makes a lazy hum in response. “Are you ever going to let me see you with your robes off?”

He arches an eyebrow. “I was unaware you wished to.”

She snorts. “Of course I do. I spend rather a lot of time thinking about it.”

He runs his fingertips absentmindedly over the back of her thigh, each tickling pass making her shiver. “Do you, indeed?” he asks.

“Yes. And I have a _very_ vivid imagination.”

Another one of those smiles. This cannot possibly last. Nothing this good ever does. Oil is going to drip from her lamp. She’s going to get caught.

* * *

Downstairs, Hermione weaves through the noise and laughter of the party, trying to look composed. If her friends find out what she’s been getting up to with Severus, they will sour her good mood with their anger masquerading as concern. They will eventually understand. Probably. _Very_ eventually, in Ron’s case.

On her way to the kitchen, Hermione steers clear of Percy, who is talking to Oliver Wood and Audrey. Lavender watches the trio, not-so-sneakily listening in and ignoring whatever Ron is yammering to her about. The last thing Hermione wants is to get drawn into yet another conversation with Percy about his new job in the regulation of magical imports. She wonders at Lavender’s eavesdropping, until she catches the words _the Cannons’ new Keeper_ from Ron. Ah. That would explain it.

She is less successful at avoiding Horace Slughorn. He corners her next to the long kitchen table as she pours herself a glass of warm, fragrant mulled wine. Damn. He has an ingratiating smile on his face, and his moustache is full of crumbs from the mince pie in his hand.

“I’m concerned about you, Hermione,” he says, the smile no less oily as it turns down at the corners and becomes a frown. “Is he really the best choice for you?”

She blinks, all innocence, but she can tell he isn’t fooled. He knows. They weren’t as careful as they could have been when they left the bedroom. Hermione turned at the last second to kiss Severus’s cheek. Slughorn must have seen them.

“I don’t know what you mean,” she says.

Slughorn sighs, like she has disappointed him by not instantly spilling all of her secrets. “I think you do.” He shakes his head. “Honestly, you and Severus? If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes, I wouldn’t believe it. How did it even start?”

_In a broom cupboard at Ron’s birthday party._

“I’m sorry, sir, but I don’t think that is any of your business.”

 _Sir_. She could kick herself for calling him that. Like she's still a schoolgirl, eager for her teacher’s approval.

“Hermione, think about your future. He is not well liked in our world, and you are so ambitious. You want to make a difference. His reputation will hold you back. And, well, there are things you don’t know about him, my girl.”

Things she doesn’t know about him? Harry already shouted Severus’s deepest secret across a battlefield.

Didn’t he?

“What information do you think I’m lacking?” she asks.

“It is not my secret to tell.” Stroking his moustache, scattering crumbs, he sighs. “But I would strongly advise you to end this thing with him.”

Something like panic tightens around Hermione’s throat at those words. _End this thing with him_.

“We’re just having fun,” she says, voice too high and forceful. She takes a sip from her glass, trying to swallow her panic along with the spiced wine. “It’s nothing serious. It’s not going anywhere.”

It tastes like a lie, but she isn’t ready for it to be all out in the open. She wants her secret romance to remain behind locked doors—wants to keep Severus to herself for now.

“Ah.” Slughorn beams. “I am relieved to hear that. I must admit, I worried that he may have slipped you a love potion.”

She huffs, her face warming with an angry flush at Slughorn’s assumption that Severus would need a love potion in order to seduce her.

“You know those have been outlawed,” she says.

Slughorn looks as if he pities her.

* * *

Not five minutes after her conversation with Slughorn, Hermione finds Severus digging through the overloaded coat rack in the entryway. When he knocks over the troll foot umbrella stand, he lets out something near a growl and summons his coat with an Accio. Several of the other jackets fall to the tiled floor. He leaves them there.

“You’re going already?” she says.

“Yes.”

There is no one around, so she darts in closer to steal a kiss. Severus steps back, out of her reach, the dodge as effective as is if he conjured a wall between them. Her stomach sinks.

“What’s wrong?” she asks.

“Nothing.” His mouth presses into a thin line, no hint of that warm smile he’d given her earlier. “Though I think this has run its course, don’t you? It was fun, but it’s unlikely to go anywhere.”

 _Oh_. He overheard.

“Severus,” she says, trying to touch his arm. He jerks away. “I don’t… I was hardly going to speak candidly about anything private to Horace Slughorn, was I?”

Why is he so angry? She can’t believe he would want her to reveal all to anyone—Slughorn least of all.

“Don’t go,” she says. “I’m sorry, but I didn’t want to broadcast anything without discussing it with you first. I didn’t agree with anything Slughorn said about you.”

He sneers, the twist of his mouth catapulting her six years back in time. “No? I did not hear you contradict him, so _I see no difference._ ” Each clearly enunciated syllable punches her in the gut. “Why would I stay?”

He walks away without waiting for a response, robes billowing.

She lets him go.


	2. Chapter 2

_Previously: He sneers, the twist of his mouth catapulting her six years back in time. “No? I did not hear you contradict him, so_ I see no difference _.” Each clearly enunciated syllable punches her in the gut. “Why would I stay?”_

_He walks away without waiting for a response, robes billowing._

_She lets him go._

* * *

_Eight years later_

Severus travels by ferry for the last leg of his journey. It’s the same way his mother brought him here, the one time they were able to visit her homeland. He couldn’t have been more than five or six years old at the time, but the memory remains vibrant, never fading around the edges. He can still feel the phantom touch of his mother’s hand squeezing his as the island comes into view. The curious, sparkling joy at meeting others like them was only outmatched by the relief at getting away from Tobias.

Rose-tinged nostalgia creeps over him every time the waves rock the ferry. His long ago journey with Eileen isn’t the inspiration behind his choice of transport. Not entirely. He doesn’t want Granger to have any warning about his arrival—no Flooing to her office, no using the official apparition point in Kirkwall.

Of all the places in the UK, why did she choose Orkney?

Standing out on the deck, Severus closes his eyes. The salt spray on his face makes him feel more alive than he has in weeks. He’s been in Switzerland, researching the potential applications of several magical plants that grow in the Alps. Being landlocked for too long always makes him tetchy, like he’s back in Cokeworth. This is better. Smoothing a hand over his transfigured robes, he breathes deep.

Minerva is to blame for this unexpected journey. She planted the idea when they were sitting in her office, drinking tea and eating shortbread and ignoring the pointed stares sent their way by Albus’s portrait.

“If you skip this year’s Christmas party,” Minerva said, “I may very well end up drinking too much Firewhisky and telling everyone about that time you accidentally called me Mum in your first year of teaching. Probably best you come along and keep an eye on me.”

He didn’t dignify this with a response. Bloody thorn in his side.

Minerva sighed. “Stubborn arse. Maybe I’ll have better luck attempting to blackmail Hermione into coming back, but I doubt it.”

Severus paused, his teacup halfway to his mouth. Why would Granger skip their gatherings?

An owl from Slughorn arrived, distracting Minerva with an invitation to one of his dinner parties. She made the same face she used to make upon finding Lockhart in the staffroom—as if she’d just stepped in something unpleasant.

“Have you ever gone to one of these ghastly things?” she asked.

“Of course not.”

Severus had never been invited.

“I suppose Horace parades Potter and his friends in front of his guests like living trophies,” he said. It was a clumsy way to direct the conversation back to Granger, but he doubted Minerva would notice. She was a Gryffindor.

Pouring them both another cup of perfectly brewed tea, Minerva shook her head. “Ronald has gone a few times—I suspect because he heard some famous Quidditch players would be in attendance—but the others never have.” She added a splash of milk to Severus’s cup, just as he liked it. “Contrary to what you seem to think, Harry doesn’t actually enjoy being a celebrity. Nor does Hermione, for that matter. It’s a bit of a liability in her line of work.”

“Being famous prevents her from trying to convince House Elves to accept paycheques and retirement plans?”

“Oh, she moved on from the Ministry years ago. Didn’t you know? She’s a private investigator now.”

It felt strangely like a blow to the sternum, discovering that he no longer knew such basic information about her. Well, she was to blame for that.

“Still searching for Percy, I imagine,” Minerva said, her expression turning sombre.

Percy Weasley had gone missing some years before. Just like Wood.

Now, Severus tightens his grip on the cold handrail. He knows nothing about Weasley’s disappearance, but he is certain Oliver Wood didn’t simply abandon the life he’d built. Someone made him vanish. Severus is perfectly capable of finding the culprit on his own, but he can’t very well rub his success in Granger’s face if he takes that route.

_His reputation will hold you back. And, well, there are things you don’t know about him, my girl._

Severus takes another long, slow breath. On his first day of school, Albus had insisted that as Severus’s Head of House, Slughorn needed to know. Even at the age of eleven, Severus should have gone with his instincts. He should have refused.

* * *

Granger’s office is tucked back on a side street in the magical quarter of Kirkwall, on the first floor of a grey stone building that is shared with an apothecary. The narrow stairwell smells like a potions store—herbal and smoky. Another wave of nostalgia, stained with bitterness.

Phocidae Investigative Services has a harbour seal on its logo. Severus stares at it for a few drawn-out moments, his mouth going dry, his fingers gripping the cold metal of the handle. He considers turning back, but he has come all this way.

“I’ll be with you in just a moment,” a feminine voice says from somewhere behind a stack of filing cabinets as Severus enters the office. Something about the nasal Essex accent is gratingly familiar. A former student, most likely. The sound brings melting cauldron bottoms and sloppy essays to mind.

“There we are. Sorry about the wait. Now, how can I—Professor! Hello.”

Lavender Brown smiles at him as if she was never on the receiving end of one of his tirades about the incompetence of his students. Her lips are painted red, and expertly applied makeup emphasises her brown eyes, but no attempt has been made to conceal the scars that run from her neck down to her chest.

“Miss Brown,” he says. “I am no longer anyone’s professor.”

“Bet you’re happy about that. Wait. Are _you_ Hermione’s ten o’clock appointment?” Giggling, she carries on without waiting for a reply. “Of course you are. Why else would you be here? To catch up with me? I mean, we can do that if you want. I bet you have the best stories.”

He arches an eyebrow.

“All right, maybe not,” she says, gesturing to a cluster of armchairs on the other side of the room. “Make yourself comfortable, and I’ll just go see if—”

“Lavender,” Granger says, not looking up from the papers in her hand as she emerges from behind a frosted glass door. “Did you chase up that… Oh.”

She has changed. He doesn’t know why he expected her to look the same after nearly a decade. Her curly hair is shorter, brushing her shoulders. There is something different about the way she carries herself, too. Straighter posture, quicker steps.

The curves of her body are the same—still soft and full—and he does not imagine how it would feel to grab her hips, pull her close. He does not replay a hundred memories of her lips parted not in surprise, but in ecstasy.

He does not still want her.

“Mr _Bedale_ , I presume?” Granger says, recovering. “What are you doing here?”

“Visiting Skara Brae and gossiping with your assistant,” he says.

“You’ll enjoy that,” she says, matching his dry tone. “It’s fascinating.”

“Skara Brae or the gossip?” Miss Brown asks.

“Both,” Granger says. “But only one has a cafe. Right.This way, please.”

Severus follows her through the frosted glass door to a cramped office with a desk, two rickety chairs, and more bookcases than most people would think was reasonable. Several files are stacked on the desk, all arranged at perfect right angles.

A familiar fragrance wafts towards him as she moves to the other side of the desk. Her perfume is still the same light, citrusy scent. That fragrance used to surround him when he kissed a slow path down her chest and—

“Why Bedale?” she asks, gesturing for him to sit.

Severus clears his throat. “It is a town in North Yorkshire. Near the village of Snape.”

“I see. So that was… what? A test? I was supposed to look into Mr Bedale, find there was no such person, and eventually land on your true identity? You came all the way up here to show me I have no business being a private investigator if I don’t pick up on such an obvious clue?”

“And the visit to Skara Brae, of course.”

She lets out a noise that is half scoff, half laugh. “Why are you really here?”

“My business partner has gone missing.”

Granger pauses for a beat before saying, “And you want to hire _me_.” It’s not a question. Her smile isn’t the same unguarded one she used to give him when they were alone. This smile is professional, distant. Like a uniform she puts on every morning. “If I take this case, are there going to be more of these little tests?”

“Only if you prove incompetent.”

“All right. As I am entirely competent, that shouldn’t be a problem.” She opens a new file with a quick flick of her wrist. “Now, what’s your business partner’s name?”

“Oliver Wood.”

Her look of surprise rings false. Ah. Unless he is mistaken, she already knows all about his business. Smugness threatens to lift his lips into a smirk.

“And when did he go missing?”

“Three weeks ago—on the fourth of November.”

She doesn’t react to this. She doesn’t have to. He knows how unlikely it is that Wood will be found alive after that amount of time.

“Does Oliver have any enemies?” she asks.

“Several thousand Puddlemere United fans who were disgruntled about his retirement from Quidditch. Other than that, not that I know of.”

It was Wood’s retirement from Quidditch that prompted their partnership. Wood wanted a business to invest in, and Severus wanted his funds. It helped that Wood had not been entirely inept as a student. Severus could not have partnered with someone who did not have sufficient knowledge of brewing. If not for the constant Quidditch talk, Wood would be almost tolerable.

Granger takes him through more expected questions—the same things the Aurors asked him, in the same clipped tone. Eventually, she draws her lower lip between her teeth and taps the end of her quill against her desk.

“Would… Do you think anyone would ever hurt Oliver to get at you?” she asks.

Slughorn’s words from years ago thicken the air between them. _He is not well liked in our world_.

“Perhaps,” Severus says. “If that is the case, it will make your job easier. Only a complete fool would think that would be an effective way to hurt me.”

She looks like she wants to ask what _would_ hurt him, but she leaves it.

“In my experience,” she says, “it’s never beneficial to assume people aren’t idiots. I’ll need a list of names, and then I’ll get started on this as soon as possible.” Standing up, she escorts him out to the waiting room. “Lavender will take that information from you, and she’ll be in touch if I need anything more from you.”

 _Lavender_ will be in touch. Granger extends her hand towards him. The skin of her palm is soft and warm and familiar against his.

“If you’ll excuse me,” she says, “I have another appointment.”

She walks away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Credit for the idea of Snape accidentally calling Minerva “Mum” when he first started teaching goes to a tumblr post I saw ages ago. I wish I could remember the username of the OP in order to give proper credit. If you know it, let me know!


	3. Chapter 3

_Previously: “My business partner has gone missing.”_

_Granger pauses for a beat before saying, “And you want to hire_ me _.”_

* * *

She still looks for Percy everywhere. A shock of red hair, a freckled face, or a pair of horn-rimmed glasses never fail to make her catch her breath and _hope_. It has been five years since that night at the Burrow. The last Order party she attended.

Percy and Hermione got marvellously drunk together that night. George—Merlin, how long has it been since she saw George?—was delighted by the bookworms cutting loose. Hermione hadn’t seen George grin so much since before the war. Audrey smirked and told Percy he would have no sympathy from her when he woke up with a massive hangover in the morning.

Hermione can’t remember actually drinking that much—a detail that has always needled her. Percy suggested they split the last few drops in a bottle of firewhisky, and a couple of sips later they were both so giggly that George very nearly succeeded in talking them into playing pranks on the other party guests.

At some point, Percy and Hermione decided to go on a walk around the orchard to clear their heads. It seemed a good idea at the time.

“The night air is as effective as a hangover potion, Hermione,” he claimed.

The last thing she remembers is sinking down into long, fragrant grass and telling Percy he should go on without her because she was going to take a nap right there. What seemed like a heartbeat later, she woke up with a splitting headache, chilled by morning dew. All alone.

Percy hasn’t been seen since that night.

Now, pouring muesli into a bowl, Hermione tries to steady her nerves. Looking into Oliver’s disappearance will likely mean speaking to Audrey. Percy and Oliver were friends.

 _Are_ friends. She always vacillates between past and present tense when it comes to Percy, shrinking away from what she knows, deep down, to be the likely truth: she was the last person to see him alive.

The cats trail after her as she takes her breakfast out to the conservatory: Winifred, Humphrey, and dear, elderly Crookshanks. Yawning, she sips her too-hot, giant-sized mug of coffee. The conservatory is her favourite part of her tiny cottage. She can sit in her most comfortable chair, surrounded by lush plants that Neville has bred to be drought resistant enough to withstand her neglect, and watch the sea. As she gazes out at the restless waves, a seal leaps above the water—a flash of dark grey, spotted with black.

If Hermione saw omens in everything, the way Lavender still does, she would take the seal as a good one. Pity she puts no stock in Divination. A genuine omen of good things to come would be welcome.

Crookshanks hops onto the table, where he is absolutely _not_ allowed. Pressing a paw against the window, he meows his creaky old meow.

“Come on, Crooks,” Hermione says, nudging him. “You know better than that.”

He looks at her as if she has just denied him a second helping of breakfast, but he obeys.

Hermione pushes the muesli around her bowl with her spoon as it gets soggier, her mind racing. God, she can’t believe she actually took Severus’s— _Snape’s_ — case. What was she thinking?

In one of her weaker moments, she bought some of his potions by owl-order, though she did it under Lavender’s name. They were extraordinary. Not that she expected anything less. But there is a world of difference between sneakily sampling the offerings of her ex’s new company and working on a bloody case for him.

The day before, the sound of his voice was enough to bring everything crashing back—the stolen moments, the whispered words, his parting jab at her.

After the disastrous Christmas party all those years ago, Hermione waited weeks for him to cool down, apologise for his ugly words, and hear her explanation. He never did. Cutting her off completely seemed an overreaction to a simple misunderstanding. Self-preservation, maybe. As the days passed without word, she started to tell herself that Slughorn was right: that Snape would only hold her back, it couldn’t go anywhere serious. Her own version of self-preservation.

The thought still feels as if it doesn’t fit. There is something else—some invisible piece that gets in the way, blocks her. Something not quite right. She got the same off-kilter feeling when he said Skara Brae. It sounded like he borrowed the words from Minerva, claiming her accent for himself.

Maybe it’s a side effect of living in the Scottish Highlands for so many years, and Hermione needs to stop reading hidden meanings into everything. Maybe Lavender and her omens are a bad influence.

Taking a gulp of now-cool coffee, she grimaces. She will need every ounce of Gryffindor courage she possesses if she’s to face Snape again anytime soon. Last night, for the first time in years, her traitorous subconscious made her dream of him.

In the months following their split, she used to forget in dreams. She let him touch her, let him fuck her, not remembering they were no longer an _us_. But even in her dreams, he never fully removed his robes.

He didn’t last night, either, though her dream self did ask. In some mockery of their final moments together, she said, “Are you ever going to let me see you with your robes off?” as she dropped to her knees in that room at Grimmauld Place.

He let out a dark chuckle. “I was unaware you wished to.”

The same words they’d exchanged the night of the Christmas party, but she didn’t recognise them in her sleep. She carried on without even an inkling of deja vu, unbuttoning the same few buttons as always and unfastening his trousers. He was already hard, but she didn’t touch him. Not yet.

“Of course I do,” she said, pausing to kiss the hollow next to his hipbone. She caught the not-quite-suppressed hitch in his breath, claimed it as a victory. “I spend rather a lot of time thinking about it.”

In real life, he’d had a coherent reply to this. In the dream, it was only a muffled curse as she took his cock into her mouth. The slight pull of his fingers winding into her hair and the slick movement of her lips and tongue over him felt so real. She loved the way he threw his head back, completely lost in sensation—loved the low, almost awed sound of him whispering her name. There was no bitterness between them. There was only what they used to be.

Such a pretty lie.

“Fuck,” he said as she slipped a hand between her thighs and touched herself. “Let me.”

The strident beep of her alarm made the room at Grimmauld evaporate. She sat alone in her bed, disorientated and unsatisfied. Ignoring the throbbing ache left behind by the dream, she stomped to the bathroom to try to wash away the memory.

Now, snapping out of her thoughts and giving up on the muesli, Hermione carries her bowl back into the kitchen. She can do this. She can face Snape if she has to, the same as she did yesterday. Dreams are bizarre, meaningless jumbles of information. Nothing more.

She does not still want him.

——

Hermione takes the long way to work, walking against the biting wind. The sight of their building makes her feel a bit warmer, lightness spreading through her chest. They’ve come a long way from the days when she and Lavender shared a flat and worked out of the dining room. She wouldn’t call them _successful_ , exactly, but they no longer have papers spilling into their living areas and an airer of damp laundry taking up the space between their desks. Progress. Her cold-reddened nose and cheeks start to thaw as she climbs the apothecary-scented stairs.

“I have that list,” Lavender says before Hermione even has a chance to hang up her coat. “Snape’s potential enemies. It’s, erm, _extensive_ , but I think we can discount a few names right away.”

Hermione frowns. “What makes you say that?”

“Well, three of the names are Neville, Ron, and Harry. Harry actually took the top spot. Although, hmm. I don’t know—should we discount Neville? Snape _was_ pretty awful to him. I can’t see Neville hurting anyone, though.”

“No, I can’t either, but people are always surprising me.” Checking her frizzy, windblown curls in Lavender’s desk mirror, Hermione gives it up as a bad job and ties her hair back. “Where did I rank on Snape’s list?”

“Err, nowhere. You aren’t on it.”

Hermione can’t quite identify the sensation that spreads through her abdomen. She should be relieved, but there’s a strange heaviness, like she mostly feels forgotten.

“Harry gets top billing, and I don’t even merit a mention?” she says with a snort. “Should I be insulted?”

Lavender shrugs. “He did trust you enough to hire you.” Chewing on a pink-laquered nail, she scans the parchment again. “Actually, I’ve been thinking about that. Isn’t he pretty much the greatest Legilimens alive now? Why does he need us? Can’t he just—” she waggles her fingers, “—do his spy thing and work it out himself?”

“That thought had occurred to me as well. Maybe it’s all a ruse so he can investigate me himself.”

Lavender grins. “Do you have Oliver hidden in your loft? You can tell me.”

“It’d make this case a lot easier if I did.”

“It’d be a great business model, too. Imagine our ratio of solved cases if we knew all of the answers going in.”

Hermione laughs. “Do you really think we could get away with that for long?”

The way Lavender rolls her eyes reminds Hermione irresistibly of the Lavender who used to sleep in the next bed in the Gryffindor dorms.

“I’m not saying we should do it,” Lavender says, “but of course we could get away with it. Anyway, do you want to hear who did make the list?”

“Yeah, go on. Give me the top five.”

“Harry Potter, Horace Slughorn, Petunia Dursley, Albus Dumbledore, and Zacharias Smith.”

“ _Dumbledore?_ A dead man made the list?”

Honestly. Snape can’t be serious.

“I guess?” Lavender says. “Maybe he meant the portrait. Which one do you want to start with first?”

“Slughorn, I suppose—though we should talk to Harry just so we can say we explored all avenues. But first, I need to go to Devon.”

“Devon?”

“Audrey Weasley. Oliver and Percy became pretty good friends once they no longer had to share a dorm.”

“Did they? That sounds familiar.”

Smiling, Hermione bumps her shoulder against Lavender’s. “I need to find out whether Audrey has been in touch with Oliver, and I’d rather get that one out of the way as soon as possible.”

Lavender places a hand on Hermione’s arm, her touch gentle. “Want me to do it?”

“No, but thanks. You can tag along if you want.”

“Yeah, of course. But you know what I’m thinking we should do?”

Of course Hermione knows. The same thing Lavender always wants to do, because it makes her feel all cloak and dagger.

“Polyjuice?”

Lavender nods. “Polyjuice.”


	4. Chapter 4

_Previously: “But first, I need to go to Devon.”_

_“Devon?”_

_“Audrey Weasley. Oliver and Percy became pretty good friends once they no longer had to share a dorm.”_

* * *

Eileen finds Severus at Skara Brae. He turns a corner, and there she is: dark hair standing out against the pale stones. Her skin is less sallow than he remembers—brighter, like she is hoarding all of the sunshine Orkney doesn’t get. A wide streak of white at the point of her widow’s peak is the only hint she has aged at all.

“One of my cousins saw you this morning,” she says by way of a greeting. “What brings you here?”

“Business. Are you well?”

She smiles like she never did in Cokeworth. “I am.”

Meeting her here isn’t a surprise. It’s why he made the journey. They turn towards the other half of the neolithic village—the one that never needed excavating, because it is still inhabited. The one Muggles cannot see. They climb up the hidden hill, past curving stone buildings topped with grass roofs, catching glimpses of the lives within. In the house where Eileen grew up, a wizard paces the floor, soothing a crying baby.

For once, Eileen doesn’t ask Severus to stay here. It has been her constant refrain ever since he helped her leave Tobias: _come with me. Come home_. Instead, she talks about her extended family, her life here. She asks about his work.

When the time comes for him to leave, Eileen straightens his collar, like she used to adjust his school robes when they said goodbye at Kings Cross. Like she used to smooth out that hideous transfigured smock he wore as a child.

With a tight smile, she repeats the words she said to him every September until his fifth year. “Never tell anyone, Severus.”

He came closer to telling Granger than he will ever admit to Eileen. A few breaths away from being truly vulnerable.

“No matter how much you think you can trust them,” Eileen says, “you can’t.”

As if he does not know.

* * *

Audrey still lives in the house she and Percy bought shortly after they married: a stone cottage on the edge of Ottery St Catchpole, near his parents. Hermione and Lavender walk up the path, through an herb garden that any Potioneer would envy.

Hermione’s borrowed body is Tonks-level clumsy; she catches her feet on several paving stones that never gave her trouble before. Hermione’s suit fits the man’s body, but wearing it reminds her of things she would rather forget. She should have gone with Lavender’s plan to use Pomona Sprout and Poppy Pomfrey’s hair—though how Lavender obtained said hair, she still has not revealed.

Coming as herself would have been preferable, but Audrey has been cold to her since Percy’s disappearance. Not that Hermione can blame her. If Hermione was married to someone who wandered off with another woman and was never seen again… Well.

Audrey’s office is in a little outbuilding off to the side of the main house. She greets them herself, a professional and polished version of the woman Hermione once knew.

“Mr and Mrs Wood?” she says. There is a strained quality to her smile. “Right this way.”

Hermione is playing the part of Mr Wood in this little farce. Lavender’s idea. Percy made Arthur’s dreams come true with his choice of partner: he married a Muggle. Audrey also happens to be a couples counsellor. 

“In this session,” Audrey says, “we’ll clarify the problems to work on, and then agree on some clear goals to work towards. Does that sound okay with both of you?”

Hermione agrees, though she does not want to give Lavender the opening to clarify their invented problems. During their brainstorming session, Lavender’s suggestions grew more and more outlandish, eventually resembling something from an episode of _Jeremy Kyle_. Lots of, “Let’s tell her I had an affair with your brother, and now we don’t know whether the baby I’m expecting is your son or your nephew.”

But when Audrey prompts them to talk about what led them to seek counselling, Lavender delivers a speech about them drifting apart and losing sight of why they fell in love, adding just the right level of wobble to her voice. It is moments like this that remind Hermione why she hired Lavender. She is the best actor Hermione has ever met.

_Almost_ the best.

The therapy session is interesting, but it’s not why they are here. As they stand to go, Lavender proves her acting skills again by knocking over one of the framed pictures on Audrey’s desk and making it look like an accident. 

To Hermione’s relief, the picture inside is still the same: a still Muggle photograph of Audrey, Percy, and Oliver.

“Oh my goodness,” Lavender says. “You know Oliver?” 

Audrey blinks. “Yes. You know him, too?”

“He’s my cousin,” Hermione says.

Lavender giggles. “Small world. Have you heard from him recently?”

Pressing her lips into a thin line, Audrey shakes her head. “No. Not for a while.”

“Oh,” Hermione says. “Neither have we.”

“Are you close?” Lavender asks.

“He was friends with my late husband,” Audrey says.

It’s true, but it’s not the whole story. There’s something Audrey is holding back; Hermione has heard enough half-truths to tell the difference. Perhaps it’s only that said husband hasn’t been officially confirmed as _late_ , but Hermione doesn’t think so.

“It was nice meeting you both,” Audrey says, ushering them towards the door. “Give Oliver my regards.”

* * *

She is wearing her fancy dress costume.

Severus stands in the doorway of Granger’s office, the scene before him transporting him as effectively as a Time Turner. Rising up onto her tiptoes, Granger opens one of the taller filing cabinets. The last time Severus saw her in that black suit and Gryffindor red tie was at Ronald Weasley’s birthday party.

She always found him at the Order parties—brought him a drink and coaxed him into conversation. The only person, other than Minerva, who bothered. At some point, he started looking for Granger, accepting invitations because he knew she would be there. Which is how he found himself at _Ronald Weasley’s_ birthday party, of all things.

“Let me guess,” she said that night, passing him a glass of warming firewhisky, “they didn’t tell you it was fancy dress?”

Something about the way she smirked, leaning one shoulder against the wall and crossing her arms, made a spark of interest shoot through him. At recent events, she had taken to standing ever-so-slightly too close as their conversation stretched on and on. He wondered if the trend would continue.

“Do you believe I would have worn a costume if they had?” he asked.

“Hmm, fair point. How many dunderheads have asked what your costume is?”

“Counting you, I’ve spoken to seven people, so… Six.”

She laughed. Gesturing at her suit, she said, “I am renowned Muggle-born Arithmancer, Matthew Jones.”

“And how many dunderheads have smiled and nodded, rather than admitting they have never heard of such a person?”

“All but you, of course.” She shifted closer to him, swirling the amber coloured firewhisky in her glass. 

That particular corridor of the Burrow was one of Severus’s favourite place of refuge. It was narrow, dimly lit, cushioned from the noise of the party by several newly-built rooms, and had very little foot traffic. Few people apart from Granger ever found him there.

That night was like countless others, until it wasn’t. Never before had they slipped into a broom cupboard to hide from Ronald’s elderly aunt, their bodies pressed close. And on all of those other nights, Granger had certainly never stretched up to brush a shy, fleeting kiss against his mouth.

He can still remember exactly how soft her lips were. He remembers how she tasted of birthday cake and firewhisky. He remembers those soft lips against his ear, asking him to touch her. He remembers sliding his hands under that very jacket, unbuttoning those trousers.

Not what he wants to be thinking when he is standing in her office.

“Hello,” he says, shoving the inconvenient memories under his shields. He sounds neutral—almost bored. Good.

Granger’s cheeks turn pink. “Oh, hi. Good timing. I had a different face until about ten minutes ago.”

She tells him about her fruitless trip to Devon. Severus cannot recall Wood ever mentioning Percy Weasley’s wife, but he has to agree that the fact that both wizards disappeared under mysterious circumstances cannot be ignored. He doesn’t know why Granger and Miss Brown needed to be disguised to speak to Audrey Weasley, but if Granger wishes to waste a valuable potion, that’s her business.

“About this list,” Granger says. “You aren’t serious about including Dumbledore in the top five, are you?”

Of course he wasn’t. 

“Have you met that portrait?” he asks. “It’s a menace.”

Her soft lips twitch at the corners, as if she almost wants to smile.

“I’ll talk to Minerva about interrogating it thoroughly,” she says with a roll of her eyes. “Why is Zacharias Smith on the list?”

“Disgruntled former employee.”

“Ah.” Wrinkling her nose in the same way she used to when he was deliberately being an arse, she lets out a little laugh. “Are you really going to make me talk to Harry’s aunt Petunia?”

“It does seem rather cruel, even for me. But you requested a list of people who might wish to see me hurt, and Petunia absolutely must be included in any list of that description.”

“I suppose that’s true. Still. I should get hazard pay.”

“Quite likely, but you won’t.”

Another lip twitch. As if remembering who he is, she smooths her features into a neutral expression. She will not give him anything but her most professional of smiles.

He should go to Devon and question Audrey Weasley himself. Show Granger how it’s done.

* * *

Audrey Weasley’s kitchen window is a bright yellow square against the darkness of the countryside. Severus’s research suggested she spends most Tuesday evenings alone, with nothing but her television and a takeaway for company, but two women sit at the small table.

One of them he has met in passing at Order functions, always on Percy Weasley’s arm. The other he knows quite well. He suffered through far too many years of attempting to teach her. She is not wearing any sort of disguise; she smiles at Audrey with her own mouth, laughs her own laugh.

Lavender Brown.


	5. Chapter 5

_Previously: One of them he has met in passing at Order functions, always on Percy Weasley’s arm. The other he knows quite well. He suffered through far too many years of attempting to teach her. She is not wearing any sort of disguise; she smiles at Audrey with her own mouth, laughs her own laugh._

_Lavender Brown._

* * *

The house is quiet. Its sole occupant is not due back for several hours. Granger will not approve of this breaking and entering business, but that is her problem. Staring at the cauldron on the kitchen sideboard, Severus contemplates the possibilities.

One: Audrey Weasley is secretly a witch. Unlikely.

Two: Percy was brewing this Elixir to Induce Euphoria before he disappeared, and his wife feels that clearing it up would be tantamount to admitting he is gone. Also unlikely. The potion would have spoilt long ago. This one is not perfect, but that is down to the brewing, not because it is past its best by date. If Severus was still burdened with the responsibility of teaching, he would give it an Acceptable grade. Perhaps. If he was feeling generous.

Three: Audrey has a magical paramour or close friend. Possible. 

Four: Percy taught his wife to make a few potions. Also possible. This particular potion does not require the use of a wand. Severus once taught Argus Filch how to brew it. 

Conjuring a glass vial, Severus takes a sample of the elixir. As there are poisonous ingredients, it can go badly wrong. Worth analysing more thoroughly.

The rest of the house does not yield much of interest. All of Audrey’s clothing is shoved to one side of the wardrobe. The other half is empty, as if she is still waiting for Percy to come back and fill it with his perfectly starched shirts. The chest of drawers reveals a similar setup.

As Audrey’s return draws closer, Severus casts a precautionary Disillusionment Charm on himself, shivering as the cold trickles down his spine. With a nonverbal Geminio, he makes a copy of her appointment book.

Time to go see Granger.

* * *

Hermione’s throat goes dry. Taking a sip of tea, she takes a moment to suppress her knee-jerk reaction.

Why would Lavender be at Audrey’s? She can guess why Snape was there—to do his own investigating and show Hermione up—but Lavender is her friend. The most likely scenario is Lavender going there to question Audrey on her own. Lavender has seen Audrey’s expression ice over in Hermione’s presence.

“No matter how much you think you can trust people,” Snape says, “you cannot.”

She can’t decipher that look in his eyes. Pity? Smugness? There is no time to scrutinise it before angry heat rises into her face and forces words past her lips.

“Oh, so you think it’s better to cut ties with someone without letting them explain, then?” she asks.

God. _Why_ did she say that? Snape acts as if the comment doesn’t land—as if the words skate over his skin, meaningless. 

“Occasionally it is necessary,” he says, calm and even.

_Occasionally it is necessary_. Honestly. Where is the man who raged at everything Harry did? Why is he so bloody composed when it comes to her? Taking a deep breath, Hermione stands up.

“Wait here for a moment, please,” she says, swallowing her flash of emotion like it means as little to her as it does to him.

She marches around her desk and out to the waiting room. As she enters, an owl swoops away from the open window in a blur of tawny feathers. Lavender leans against the windowsill, heedless of the freezing gusts of wind, smirking to herself and reading a scroll of parchment.

“What’s that?” Hermione asks.

Lavender shoves the letter into her pocket. “Something from my mum. Another neighbour has installed that astro turf stuff. She’s convinced they’re part of a Muggle cult of some sort. What’s up?”

Mrs Brown’s owl is snowy white, like Hedwig was. Not tawny. Hermione bites the inside of her cheek.

“Nothing, really,” Hermione says. “Just need a file. No, don’t worry. I’ll get it.” Opening a drawer, she retrieves the folder with all of the information they’ve gathered so far on Horace Slughorn. In as casual a tone as she can manage, she adds, “What’d you get up to last night?”

“Oh, not much. I treated myself to a steak dinner, a bubble bath, and the new issue of _Witch Weekly_. You?”

Almost the best actor Hermione knows.

“Fell asleep reading on the sofa at half past nine,” Hermione says. “You know what a wild life I lead. I’d like you to focus on Petunia today, all right? I’m going to do some digging on Slughorn.”

Lavender heaves a put-upon sigh. “The things I do for you.”

“The things you do for a paycheque.”

* * *

Agreeing to get into a car with Snape was a mistake. Not that he is a bad driver—he’s more confident behind the wheel than any other wizard Hermione has met. It’s the memories that are the issue.

The only other time they’ve been in a car together was back when she still worked for the Ministry. During the few hours she had free during a tense, week-long conference with goblins in Somerset, he took her out to the countryside in a hire car. Her idea.

The plan was to blow out the cobwebs with a meandering drive followed by a long walk. Instead, they pulled off onto a seldom-used lane, cast a Notice-Me-Not Charm on the car, and she climbed into his lap. Her idea again, murmured in his ear as he drove.

He is in the driver’s seat for this trip as well. He tightens his grip on the steering wheel, and she can almost feel those fingers digging into her hips. He shifts in his seat, and she flashes back to him rising up to meet her as she shoved her knickers aside and sank down on him.

Pleasant—if unwelcome—heat twists low in her abdomen at the memories. As the car rolls to a stop down the road from Audrey’s house, Hermione focuses on the copy of Audrey’s appointment book.

“Do I want to know how you got this?” she asks.

Snape shrugs. “Of course not, but I believe you are clever enough to work it out on your own.”

“Gregory Goyle could work it out.” She sits up straighter. “There she is. She’s heading for her car.”

“Yes, I can see that.”

A single letter marks Audrey’s noon appointment for today: _L_. Snape thinks it means Lavender, of course. Hermione is trying to withhold judgment. If they discover nothing on this trip, she will tell Lavender what Snape saw and ask for an explanation.

They follow Audrey through Ottery St Catchpole and into a neighbouring village, where she snags the last available parking spot in the pay and display carpark. 

“Let me out here,” Hermione says, unbuckling her seatbelt. “I’ll make sure we don’t lose her.” 

Pulling down the visor, she casts a few glamours to disguise her appearance: straighter hair, a more pointed nose. It won’t be enough to fool Audrey if they are face-to-face, but it should allow her to blend into the background at a distance.

Audrey’s destination proves to be the Costa on the high street. Hermione waits for Audrey to get her coffee and sit at a table—alone—before she ducks inside. For herself, she orders a giant jaffa cake and the sort of sugary, frou frou coffee that would make her parents clutch their pearls. For Snape, she chooses a croissant and an espresso. At home, he usually drinks tea, but at places like this he grumbles about how he could buy a whole box of tea for what they charge to boil water and add an ordinary teabag.

Just as Hermione snags a table that places Audrey’s back to her, Snape enters. He has cast glamours on himself, turning his hair lighter and wavy, his nose a different shape. Even with a disguise, she can still spot him at a distance. It must be the scowl.

The scowl gets deeper when he sees the croissant and espresso.

“I prefer tea,” he says.

She snorts. “Not here, you don’t.”

His mouth stays in a flat line, but his eyes crinkle at the corners, the way they used to when he smiled at her. The pang that ricochets through her chest is worse than missing his touch, his body. She can’t let herself wander down the path of yearning for the laughter they used to share. That way lies nothing but heartache.

“Fair point,” he says, pausing to take a bite of croissant. “And what sugary concoction have you got for yourself?”

“How do you know it’s sugary? Maybe this is a regular cappuccino.”

“It has a gingerbread man stuck in it. And it is dusted with _glitter_.”

“Ah. Fair point.”

In the old days, Hermione would grin and ask if he wanted to try some, already knowing the answer. He would refuse, then complain about how she tasted like Honeydukes when he kissed her.

Audrey’s mysterious L saves them from an awkward silence by arriving. Not Lavender, but a Muggle woman with bright red hair and a kind smile. With the help of some Extendable Ears that have seen better days, Hermione and Snape listen in on the conversation.

“How have you been?” L asks.

“Oh, you know.” Audrey gestures vaguely. “Up and down. Mostly down. It feels like history is repeating itself. Ollie’s cousin came to see me the other day, and I just freaked out and sent him away. Ollie is one of my best mates. I should have… I don’t know, Laura. I’m a bloody mess. I’m scared. I don’t know who I can trust.”

“Why are you scared? What on earth was he involved in? Was Percy a part of it, too?”

Hermione holds her breath. Percy Weasley, involved in something dangerous? No. Apart from the Battle of Hogwarts, absolutely not.

“I don’t know. Perce… He… Ugh. Can we talk about something else? I need to get my mind off of all of it, and I haven’t even asked about you. How have you been? Distract me, please.”

“Any ideas?” Hermione whispers to Snape as Laura launches into a story about her nemesis at work that falls short of making Audrey laugh. 

Snape shakes his head. “As far as I know,Wood’s most dangerous associate is _me_.”

Hermione’s research up to this point has suggested the same thing. 

“Maybe I should investigate you,” she says, only half joking.

Snape scoffs. “You already know far more than most.”

“Does anyone know everything?”

He quirks an eyebrow, his gaze following her mug as she raises it to her lips. “Does anyone know everything about you?”

“No,” she says, “but a few people have come close.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I realise the question of whether a Muggle could brew a potion has been addressed on Pottermore, and JKaren said they couldn’t. Frankly, I don’t care (especially considering the source), so I’m going to ignore that information.


	6. Chapter 6

_Previously: “Maybe I should investigate you,” she says, only half joking._

_Snape scoffs. “You already know far more than most.”_

_“Does anyone know everything?”_

_He quirks an eyebrow, his gaze following her mug as she raises it to her lips. “Does anyone know everything about you?”_

_“No,” she says, “but a few people have come close.”_

* * *

Back in the hire car, Granger removes her glamours with the same deep sigh of relief she used to reserve for taking off her bra at the end of a long day. As Severus watches, her hair coils back into its usual unruly curls and her nose takes its natural shape. She becomes herself again.

A familiar voice comes from off to Severus’s left, muffled slightly by the rolled-up windows. Molly Weasley stands on the pavement, hands on her hips. 

“I cannot believe you, Arthur,” she says. “Another one? Did you forget what happened in Ron’s second year? What if one of the grandchildren does the same thing?”

Hmm. Arthur has obtained another flying car, then. Molly should have seen that coming.

Before Severus can comment on it to Granger, Molly glances in their direction. She makes eye contact with Granger—Severus catches the flicker of surprise on her face—but instead of coming over to say hello, she takes Arthur’s arm and hurries away.

His expression must look like a question, because Granger sighs and shrugs one shoulder.

“Molly protects her own,” she says. “And I’ve never counted as one of her own. I don’t think she ever quite forgave me for breaking Ron’s heart, and after Percy… Well.”

That anyone blames Granger for Percy Weasley’s disappearance is patently absurd, but it does explain why she now avoids Order functions. Ignoring the odd sinking in his chest, Severus crumples up the pay and display ticket and slides the key into the ignition.

“Do you have any idea why Audrey Weasley might brew potions?” he asks as he pulls out onto the road.

“What?” Granger says. “She’s a Muggle.”

“Yes. I am aware. And yet she has a cauldron full of Elixir to Induce Euphoria in her house.”

“Hmm. For a second I thought you were going to tell me she was brewing poisons or illegal love potions. I wonder why she’s brewing anything at all. Muggles can’t take most of our potions, so it’s not for herself. Was it brewed properly? She didn’t add too much wormwood or Sopophorous beans?”

Of course Granger remembers the textbook ways the potion can be turned toxic.

“It was as passable as most of the sorry efforts I’ve seen from former students,” Severus says. “It would not produce an overwhelming amount of euphoria in anyone, but nor would it harm them.”

Pages rustle as Granger flips through Audrey’s appointment book. Severus doesn’t need to take his eyes off of the road to know she is pulling her lower lip between her teeth as she thinks.

“Audrey had appointments up until five on the day Oliver went missing,” she says. “I’ll find out whether she kept the appointments, but it doesn’t tell us much. Oliver doesn’t live far from her, right? And you saw him at his home at seven that evening, so that leaves plenty of time for her to get to his and… I don’t know what.”

“I believe you know exactly what.”

“Yeah. She seemed truly distraught when talking to her friend, but that doesn’t mean much, either. Could be an act. Or guilt.” Granger sighs. “I don’t think she had anything to do with it, but she definitely knows something.”

Silence. 

Using Legilimency on Muggles is tricky. A skim of their surface thoughts causes a mild headache. Delving into anything deeper risks permanent damage. If Audrey is attempting to bury whatever she knows and avoid thinking about it, then he has no chance.

“I wonder how Lavender is doing,” Granger says after a few minutes. “I told her to focus on Petunia for a while. Assuming she isn’t secretly plotting against me, do you reckon I can fob Zacharias Smith off on her as well?”

Severus snorts. “I would find Slughorn the most unpleasant of the lot.” He pauses. “Nearly the most unpleasant. Second only to Petunia.”

“Yeah, about that. I have an invitation to Slughorn’s dinner party next weekend. That should be a good opportunity to snoop around his house, find out if he has any skeletons in the closet.”

Severus fiddles with the windscreen wipers as rain speckles the windows. It isn’t necessarily Slughorn’s skeletons that worry him.

* * *

Lavender has another letter. Hermione finds her sitting on the edge of her desk, giggling and blushing over the parchment in her hand.

“Your mother, again?” Hermione says.

“Mhm.” Lavender shoves the letter into her pocket.

“Lavender.” Hermione swallows over the lump in her throat. “What’s going on? Snape saw you at Audrey’s house the other night, and if that letter is actually from your mum, I will tap dance naked down the high street.”

All of the colour drains from Lavender’s face. Slumping down into her chair, she groans.

“I didn’t want to tell you,” she says. “I mean, I knew I’d probably have to, eventually. But…”

Hermione moves closer, placing a hand on Lavender’s back. “What’s wrong? Why don’t you want to tell me?”

“You’ll judge me.”

“Of course I won’t.”

Lavender lets out a gurgling laugh. “Oh yes you will. You absolutely will, about this. Hermione, I’m not sure if you’re aware, but you have some rather firm opinions about things.”

“What, you’re going to tell me you’ve enslaved a family of House-Elves?”

“I wish. No more tidying up, ever? Sounds heavenly.” 

“Lavender. Focus.”

“Right. Okay. Well. I thought maybe I could get some information out of Audrey on my own. You see… I’ve got to know her a bit better recently.”

“You have?”

“Oh gods.” Lavender drops her face into her hands. “I can’t look at you when I say it. I’ve chatted to her at the Burrow. Now and then. When I go there for Sunday lunch.”

Sunday lunch. Why would Lavender be invited to the Burrow for Sunday lunch? Unless…

“You’re seeing Ronald,” Hermione says, her eyebrows shooting up. “ _Again_.”

“You said you wouldn’t judge! That’s your judgy face.”

“No, no. No judgment. I’m thrilled to hear that Wavender are back together.”

“Hermione. We’ve discussed that name.”

“Have we? Hmm.” 

The tight knot in Hermione’s chest loosens and dissolves. Lavender isn’t plotting against her; she’s simply tangled up with Ron for the… How many times does this make? The seventh time? Hermione has lost count. 

“Are you happy?” Hermione asks softly.

“My happiness does not depend on Ron Weasley.” Lavender scoffs. “But things are good with us right now, yeah. Who knows whether it’ll last? Certainly not me.”

Hermione loves Lavender and Ron dearly, but she doesn’t understand how they can stand all of this breaking up and making up. From the outside, it looks like more stress than it’s worth. She is perfectly fine with all of her exes remaining exes, thank you very much.

Hermione clears her throat. “Are you getting him jewellery for Christmas again?” she asks.

“ _Hermione_.”

“Sorry, sorry.” Giggling, Hermione stumbles slightly as Lavender gives her a light shove. “I’m glad you’re both good. Oh, guess what. Snape and I followed Audrey today.”

She tells Lavender what little they learnt. Tilting her head to one side in that way she always does when she’s concentrating, Lavender takes notes.

“Percy involved in something dangerous?” Lavender says, wrinkling her nose. “I don’t know. I can’t really see it.”

“I’ve been thinking about that. He worked in the Ministry during the war. That was pretty dangerous. I already looked into everyone who got a lighter sentence back when Percy went missing, but maybe I overlooked something.” Pacing back and forth, Hermione rubs her temples. “I don’t think Oliver would have been involved back then—they weren’t friends yet—but maybe Percy told him something. Or Audrey said something, and Oliver connected the dots? And, well, Oliver is a Gryffindor, right? Maybe he went charging in, and…” 

Lavender’s hand is soft and warm on Hermione’s arm. “Are you all right, love?”

“Of course. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Hmm, maybe because this case seems linked with the deeply personal one that drove you into this line of work. But what do I know?” Lavender draws a line under all she has written so far. “What did Percy do in the Ministry after the war? Something with imports?”

“Regulation of Magical Imports,” Hermione says. “That’s a good point, actually. If he caught someone smuggling something…”

Lavender frowns. “He wouldn’t look the other way if rules were being broken, yeah. I’ll get a list of all restricted items, see if anything leaps out at us, and I’ll convince Ron to help me do some digging at the Ministry. Leave it with me.”

* * *

The pavements of Kirkwall are slick with packed-down snow. Hermione skids around a corner on her way to the sandwich shop, a bracing wind blowing her curls around her face. Even through her blindfold of hair, she spots the black-clad figure moving towards her.

“Hi,” she says. “I was just going to Floo-Call you when I got back to the office. I have updates. Well, update. It’s just about Lavender. She isn’t—” 

A hand on Hermione’s shoulder makes her words cut off. She turns to see another person with long, dark hair and sallow skin: one of her favourite former clients.

“Màiri!” Hermione says. “How are you?”

“Great, thanks,” Màiri says. Her smile is almost as wide as the one she flashed at Hermione when her case was successfully completed. “Hello, Severus.”

They’ve met?

“Màiri,” he says. “How do you know each other?”

Hermione lets Màiri lead. He might not know everything about her situation.

“Hermione helped me get out of a really, really bad relationship,” Màiri says.

That is putting it mildly. The Ministry would do nothing about that sorry excuse for a wizard, so Hermione kept digging until she found charges that would stick. She _may_ have done some breaking and entering when searching for what he had stolen, but there were extenuating circumstances. Hermione’s cheeks still flush with fury every time she thinks of it. She needs to send her former boss at the Ministry another sternly worded letter.

Nothing changes in Snape’s expression, but Hermione swears there is something new there. Something in the way he stares at her.

She wishes she could put a name to it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Credit for the ship name Wavender goes to AmiMendal. I have been laughing ever since they came up with it.


	7. Chapter 7

_Previously: Nothing changes in Snape’s expression, but Hermione swears there is something new there. Something in the way he stares at her._

_She wishes she could put a name to it._

* * *

Being back at Hogwarts always feels surreal. Scenes from her school days clash with moments from the Battle of Hogwarts in Hermione’s memory, clawing for dominance. There is the wall she once leaned against when Ron made her laugh until she was breathless. There is the wall that crumbled and killed Fred.

Swallowing hard, Hermione gives the password to the gargoyle. Minerva greets her with a smile, a cup of tea, and a tin of shortbread.

“Always so good to see you,” Minerva says. “What can I do for you?”

Hermione takes a bite of buttery shortbread as she mulls over her answer. “What can you tell me about Slughorn’s dinner parties?” she eventually says.

Minerva freezes with her teacup halfway to her mouth. “You’re actually thinking of attending?”

Hermione chuckles. “Maybe. It’s probably time I stop avoiding people. Who usually turns up?”

“Former colleagues and former Slug Club members, mostly. Horace loves to show off all of his famous acquaintances. Have you warned him that you’ll be there? He is getting on in years; his heart may give out if a member of the Golden Trio turns up by surprise.”

“I have, yes.” Feeling faintly ridiculous, Hermione watches Dumbledore’s portrait out of the corner of her eye as she asks her next question. “Ron told me several famous Quidditch players go. Anyone I might know?”

“I don’t believe so. Unless you know Gwenog Jones. He’s tried to get Ginevra to attend, of course, but she’s not having it.” Minerva tilts her head slightly. “When did you get interested in Quidditch?”

No Oliver at Slughorn’s parties, then. Of course not. Finding an obvious connection between Slughorn and Oliver would make Hermione’s life too easy. Besides, Oliver was rather publicly associated with Snape in recent years, and Hermione is well aware of Slughorn’s opinion on _that_ front. Dumbledore’s portrait looks curious, but otherwise unbothered. He sips a painted cup of tea in unison with Minerva.

“I’m not, really,” Hermione says. “I was just thinking it’d be easier if there were plenty of people there who are more famous than me.”

“Ah. Well, don’t worry, my dear. You can sit in a corner with me. We’ll drink sherry and criticise Horace’s absurd, ostentatious menu. If you want my advice, eat beforehand.”

Hermione smiles. “I’ll keep that in mind, thanks.”

* * *

Severus once again finds himself walking through Kirkwall with Granger at lunch. No encounter with Màiri this time, but he still cannot get it out of his mind. He checked the story with his mother. All true. Eileen’s comments about Granger almost approached something positive—the highest praise imaginable, coming from her. Especially when speaking of a witch.

“You are going to take Miss Brown at her word?” he asks.

Granger shrugs. “Yeah. She’s never given me any reason not to trust her.”

Severus doubts this, but he decides to drop the subject. He will keep an eye on Miss Brown and look into it himself.

“How do you know Màiri, by the way?” Granger asks.

“I met her as a child, when I came to Orkney with my mother.”

A partial truth. Màiri is one of his cousins.

Losing her footing on a patch of ice, Granger grabs his arm to steady herself. It is a fleeting touch—she yanks her hand away as soon as she regains her balance—but it reminds him of the way she used to touch his arm when they talked at Order functions. It became their signal when they were around others: their way of saying _I want you_ when they were in a packed room. 

“What Màiri’s former husband did should be illegal,” Granger says. 

She means it. That nose up, teeth clenched expression is the same one she used to wear when attempting to bully her classmates into supporting her campaign for House-Elf freedom.

Severus suddenly finds it harder to breathe.

“I spoke to Harry,” Granger says, as if his mind isn’t still snagged on her previous words. As if he can think about anything else. “Just to be thorough. I’ve ruled him out as a suspect.”

“Do you not think you may be a little biased?”

“And you’re not? Do you _honestly_ think Harry would do that? Really?”

He does not, no. Potter has many— _many_ —flaws, but he would not harm Wood. They walk for a few moments in silence.

“There’s something a bit weird going on with Harry’s aunt Petunia, though,” Granger says. “She told Lavender she was meeting up with her gardening club when Oliver went missing, but they suspend meetings during winter. We haven’t been able to work out where she actually was. I don’t think she is behind all of this, but it’s a bit strange. What reason does she have to lie?”

“Never underestimate her capacity for bitterness. Knowing Petunia, she lied to be difficult.”

Granger breathes out a laugh that forms a cloud of steam in the cold air. “Maybe. Anyway, I have to go to Azkaban soon to chat with Zacharias Smith.” She huffs. “Honestly, one of the best things Kingsley ever did was to outlaw love potions. Last week, Smith was caught slipping one into a witch’s drink.” 

“Yes,” Severus says. “Madam Rosmerta always did have a knack for spotting that. I used to keep her stocked in remedies, and—”

His words cut off as Granger grabs his arm and yanks him into an alley. They go through the narrow gap and around a corner, out of sight of the Muggles passing by. She draws her wand.

“I didn’t say Smith was caught in the Three Broomsticks,” she says. “I never even mentioned he was caught in _Hogsmeade_. It hasn’t made the news. So, either you heard about it from someone, or you’re investigating Smith yourself. Given that you’ve been snooping around Audrey’s home and probably following Lavender, my money is on the latter.”

“Is it?”

She steps closer. “Why the hell did you hire me? You could get all the answers you want with Legilimency.”

Something about the way she tilts her face up towards him in challenge takes him back to another alley, when she shoved him up against a brick wall and tugged his face down for a kiss. Not a surprise, that time. He’d been teasing her all evening, resting his hand on her thigh beneath the tablecloth, fingertips brushing the edge of her knickers.

In that alley, he expected to feel the squeeze of Side-Along Apparition—to his house or hers, it did not matter. Anywhere he could get her out of her clothes. 

Instead, she threw up some wards, unfastened his trousers, and wrapped her hand around his cock. 

“Here,” she said, pumping up and down, dragging a gasp out of him. “Now.”

And, well, who was he to deny such a reasonable request? Flipping them around so she had her back braced against the wall, he held her wrists above her head.

“Your wards are flimsy,” he said, nipping gently at the juncture between her neck and shoulder. 

“Severus,” she whined. “Don’t criticise my spellwork _now_.”

He chuckled. “I was merely going to point out that anyone could hear you.” Hitching one of her legs around his hip and pushing up her skirt, he rocked against her—against the heat he could feel through the thin cotton of her knickers. 

“They won’t,” she said. “I can be quiet.”

“We shall see.”

Shoving her knickers to one side, he buried himself inside her in one smooth thrust. That delicious moment—he always paused to savour it. Their breaths mingling, their gazes locked, her surrounding him completely. Perfection.

It made a liar of her; her mouth fell open in a moan that made his mind go blank. She kissed him with clumsy desperation, tightening around him, urging him to move. Always so impatient.

Pieces of her stayed with him long after that night. He often found himself passing an alley miles from anywhere he’d been with Granger, and suddenly he was back there, watching her breasts bounce every time his hips slammed against hers, breathing in the citrus scent of her. He could still feel the contrast of her soft skin and the rough scrape of the brick wall. 

And the lightness in his chest when she giggled at their noses bumping as he went in for a kiss. That, especially, followed him to every alley after he left her.

In Kirkwall, washed in wintry sunlight, the events speed through his memory in the time it takes for Granger to get impatient with his silence. An entire encounter, condensed into a couple of seconds.

“Why are you here, Severus?” she whispers, bringing him back to the present. “What do you want from me?”

A good question. He thought he knew the answer. He _did_ know the answer, before he came here. Before she was in front of him, at once both familiar and altered. 

Her eyes widen. They are so close. Her exhales ghost over his lips. Another vision plays out in his mind—not of the past, but of an impossible future. One in which he moves closer still, and she does not back away. One with anger-fuelled kisses and her back against that wall, her legs wrapped around him. A future in which she says his name like she used to—on a sigh. 

Severus lowers his head ever-so-slightly. Granger freezes, as if waiting for him to make the decision. Waiting for him to _dare_. 

“Answer the question,” she says.

He doesn’t. 

She walks away.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Vitellia for her excellent beta work, and to Morbidmuch and Mersheeple for alpha reading. They are all damn delights, and if you haven't read their work, you should.

_Previously: Severus lowers his head ever-so-slightly. Granger freezes, as if waiting for him to make the decision. Waiting for him to_ dare _._

_“Answer the question,” she says._

_He doesn’t._

_She walks away._

* * *

Hermione wakes up on the edge of orgasm. Hazy remnants of a dream cling to her skin: phantom touches of Severus’s hands, his mouth, his cock.

She takes a shuddering breath. The way he looked at her in that alley yesterday… God. So many long-buried memories, yanked back to the surface.

Rolling onto her back, she clenches her thighs together. The throbbing ache left behind by that dream has her trailing a hand down her belly, past the waistband of her pyjamas. Her fingers slide over sensitive, wet skin, making the heat in her abdomen grow heavier, coil tighter. She shivers.

When they weren’t in a rush to avoid getting caught, Severus always took his time exploring her breasts: sucking, caressing, biting gently. Decadent, languid afternoons spent teasing her into a state of near desperation. Remembering his deep voice murmuring things like _lovely_ against her skin, Hermione bucks up into her hand. 

Shoving her top out of the way, she palms her breast, pinches a hardened nipple. She closes her eyes, and it is him touching her—his mouth between her legs, tongue circling. If he was really there, she would thread her fingers through his hair, anchor him there. Not that there was ever any chance of him moving. He was always so focused. 

The fantasy shifts to him moving over her, bending her knees to her chest and thrusting into her. The thought is enough to send her falling over the edge. Her back arches against the explosive bursts of pleasure that pulse through her, Severus’s face still behind her closed eyelids.

Catching her breath as her senses return to her, Hermione groans.

Goddammit.

* * *

They never showered together. There is no reason Severus should think of Granger as he stands beneath the hot spray of water. And yet, it is her face—her naked body, her lush curves—he sees as he braces an arm against the tile wall and strokes his cock.

He knows exactly how she would look here, on her knees. How she would touch herself and moan as she let him fuck her mouth. How she would glance up with triumph in her eyes when he warned her that he was close.

Severus’s hand moves faster. With his eyes squeezed shut, she is there, letting him spill down her throat as he comes with a strangled groan. 

She used to look up at him after, a smirk on her reddened lips. She liked seeing him come undone. Now, there is nothing but the water circling the drain and the harsh sound of his own breathing.

Fuck.

* * *

The Dementors left Azkaban long ago, but it is still a cold, desolate place. After surrendering her wand, Hermione waits in a sterile, white room that feels as if it has been Kissed by one of the absent Dementors. Other visitors sit with her along the magical partition that stretches across the room. She recognises none of them, save Narcissa Malfoy, there to visit Lucius. Narcissa is impeccably dressed and chillingly beautiful, even here. 

They pretend not to notice each other.

Eventually, Zacharias Smith emerges on the other side of the partition. His blond hair is unkempt, the skin under his eyes smudged with dark circles. He sits down in the chair across from Hermione with the supercilious air of someone who believes he is doing her the greatest of favours by gracing her with his presence.

“Granger,” he says.

“Smith,” she says. “Where did you get the love potion?”

She doesn’t believe for a second that he was skilled enough to brew it himself. God, she hopes George isn’t back in the business of making them. George has never thought the rules applied to him.

Smith scoffs. “From a dealer. I don’t know where it came from. If I did, do you think I would be here? I would have made a plea bargain, and _that_ guy would be in here.”

Tapping her fingers on the table, Hermione studies his face. “That isn’t why I’m here, anyway. I was just curious.”

“Well? Care to enlighten me, then? Why are you here?”

“When was the last time you saw Oliver Wood?”

At this, he barks out a laugh. “When he sacked me. You don’t seriously think I had something to do with him going missing, do you? Why would I bother? I got a far better job after I left his sorry excuse for a company.”

Yes, with a large enough salary to pay for illegal, coercive potions. 

“I was out of the country when Wood went missing, anyway,” Smith says. “You can check. In Tokyo, on business _.”_ He sniffs. “If you ask me, you should be looking into Snape.”

Hermione clenches her jaw. “And why is that?”

“Err, because he’s _Snape_? He’s always on his own side—no one else’s. And think about it: Snape doesn’t exactly work well with others. He needed Wood’s funds to start the company, but now… I thought you were supposed to be a detective, Granger. Ask yourself the obvious question. Who stood to gain the most from Wood vanishing?”

* * *

“Just so you know, I’m pretty sure someone is going to try to frame you.”

Severus looks up from his half-eaten sandwich to find Lavender Brown sliding into the chair across from him. So much for his quiet, solitary meal in his favourite Muggle cafe.

“Is that so?” he asks.

“Yeah. Zacharias Smith said to Hermione that he thinks you’re responsible for Oliver’s disappearance. Oh, hello.” She smiles at a passing waiter. “Could I have a menu, please? Thank you so much.” 

Miss Brown is apparently not content to merely interrupt Severus’s meal; now she intends to eat with him. Oh, rapturous joy. 

“And you believe this means someone is attempting to frame me?” he asks.

“I mean, _maybe_ Smith thought of it himself, but you taught him for however many years. Did you ever know him to have an original thought?”

Fair point.

Severus scowls as Miss Brown eyes his crisps. She wouldn’t dare. Drawing the plate closer to himself, he adds, “And why isn’t Granger giving me this information?”

Is she avoiding him after their encounter in the alley? 

“She’s in Inverness,” Miss Brown says, mulling over the choices on the laminated menu. “Taking her cat to an animal healer. Poor thing. I think he has the Kneazle Flu.”

Can she possibly mean Crookshanks? He was old when Severus and Granger were still sneaking off together at Order gatherings. Now, he must be ancient. The Kneazle Flu is dangerous even in young animals.

“Oh, also,” Miss Brown says, “Ron has been hearing whispers about you around the Ministry. Rumours—similar to what Smith said. Honestly, I’m thinking of getting a part-time job there, because relying on _Ronald Weasley_ to get all of the gossip is just… Well. You can imagine.”

“I can, indeed.” 

* * *

Hermione is making a board.

Standing on Lavender’s desk, she tacks pictures and notes to the wall with a mild Sticking Charm. She draws red lines to mark connections. Since arriving at the office several hours ago, she has been studying Snape’s list of potential enemies in its entirety, going over and over all of the links to Oliver and Snape that Lavender compiled. 

There is something _there,_ at the back of her mind. Like a word she can’t quite remember. Something obvious she is missing. Something that would make it all come together. 

But then, she felt like that about Percy’s disappearance as well, and look how that turned out. 

Audrey is the common link between the two cases. And that brewing of hers is very strange. Hermione writes everything she knows about Audrey on the wall, but it doesn’t help that elusive idea start to take any sort of shape.

Rubbing her sore, tear-swollen eyes, she groans. This activity was supposed to get her mind off of her worries about Crookshanks, not make her mood sink even lower.

The door opens behind her, but Hermione doesn’t turn away from her work. That’ll just be Lavender, back from lunch. Lavender can wait a few more minutes to get her desk back.

“Are you abandoning your private detective work to pursue an exciting career in serial killing?” a familiar, deep voice says.

Not Lavender. Does he think he can walk in here and pretend everything is normal?

Turning around to face Snape, Hermione gives him a blank stare. “Do you really want to be alone with me if I am?”

“I believe if you wanted me dead, it would have already happened,” he says. “And I see Slughorn’s face up there. You have my full support.”

“It’s for your case,” she says, attempting a semi-graceful climb down from the desk. “Assuming you aren’t taking over the investigation yourself?”

“I am not.”

He holds her gaze for a moment, and Hermione’s memory provides a slideshow of how he used to look at her naked body. Her face heats with a blush. Why did she allow herself to fantasise about him? Now that they are face to face, it’s all she can think about. Years ago, she would have told him—whispered the details in his ear as a request. 

Silence. She should say something. Clear the air. Ask, again, what he wants from her. Not that he will give her a straight answer.

“Here,” he says in a stiff voice, handing her a vile of bright blue potion. “It is modified for the specific needs of elderly half-Kneazels. Thirteen drops twice a day for the next five days, in conjunction with the Kneazle Flu remedy the animal healer gave you.”

He made a potion for Crookshanks? Before Hermione can even begin to formulate a reply to this, the door flies open again, admitting Lavender, her cloud of sweet smelling perfume, and her mile-a-minute voice.

“Guess what,” Lavender says, not looking up from the device in her hand. Teaching her about mobile phones was a mistake. “Wait, first: have you heard of Botox? Muggles actually inject—”

“I know what it is, Lavender,” Hermione says.

“Ugh. I seriously can’t believe they do that. Anyway, remember how Harry’s aunt lied to me about where she was when Oliver went missing? Turns out she was just getting Botox. I checked it all out, and yeah. Solved that mystery.”

Snape snorts.

“Oh, hello, Professor,” Lavender says. “Just the person I wanted to see. After we spoke yesterday, I started thinking about Slughorn’s party, and I decided it might be better to have more than two sets of eyes to look around the place. I talked Ron into accepting his invitation. I’m going as his guest.” She beams. “What do you say to being Hermione’s plus-one?”


	9. Chapter 9

_Previously: “Oh, hello, Professor,” Lavender says. “Just the person I wanted to see. I was thinking about Slughorn’s party, and I decided it might be better to have more than two sets of eyes to look around the place. I talked Ron into accepting his invitation. I’m going as his guest.” She beams. “What do you say to being Hermione’s plus-one?”_

* * *

Crookshanks hisses at Hermione before she goes, which must mean he’s feeling better. He hates it when she disguises herself with Polyjuice.

It’s warmer in Devon. No bitter wind to sting her cheeks. Bracing herself, Hermione strides down the garden path and knocks on the dark green door.

“Mr Wood?” Audrey says with a smile that rings false, tucking her hair behind her ear like a nervous tell. “What can I do for you?”

“I wonder if we might talk about Oliver,” Hermione says in the borrowed voice of the unsuspecting Muggle man. “Anything you might know could help. We have no idea where he is. We don’t even know if he’s alive. Please.”

Through the open door, Hermione can see the wedding photos of Audrey and Percy that decorate the side table in the entryway: frames polished and free from dust. Percy’s wand rests in front of the pictures, as if waiting for his return. Her throat tightens.

Just past the archway that leads to the lounge, the edge of a cauldron is visible. Audrey brews because she misses Percy, Lavender claims. He taught her a few simple things. It makes her feel closer to him. Hermione wonders.

Leaning against the doorframe, Audrey shakes her head. “I wish I had something to say that might give you a little bit of hope. But it’s… quite the opposite, I’m afraid. I don’t know anything. I’m so sorry.”

Not an unexpected answer. In the cafe, Audrey told her friend that she was afraid. History was repeating itself, and she didn’t know who she could trust. Why would she confide in a random man who claimed to be Oliver’s cousin?

“I see,” Hermione says. 

“I’m just on my way out.” Grabbing her coat from the hook by the door, Audrey gives a defeated sigh. “I really am sorry. I have your number, though. I’ll call you the second I hear anything.”

She won’t. She knows _something_.

Retreating to her hire car, Hermione takes off towards the village, while Audrey goes in the opposite direction. Hermione lasts about two minutes, drumming her fingers on the steering wheel, before she pulls into someone’s drive and turns around.

Ordinarily, she doesn’t like to break the rules with her investigations. This isn’t Hogwarts, and she isn’t trying to help Harry survive whatever is determined to kill him this year. But right now, she very much wants to know what is in that cauldron.

Parking the car around the corner, Hermione walks back to Audrey’s as if she is meant to be there. No sneaking, no skulking in shadows. She goes around the side of the house with purpose and—with a little help from her wand—opens the little window next to the cauldron.

She isn’t going to go so far as to actually enter Audrey’s house without her permission. Not all of her, at any rate. With a conjured glass vial in her hand, she only needs to stick her arm inside the window to take a sample of Audrey’s potion.

It is no Elixir to Induce Euphoria—that much is certain. The potion is the colour of used dishwater, a smattering of weak bubbles floating on its surface. No scent. Hermione doesn’t have the faintest clue what it might be. Fortunately, her library is stocked with copious volumes that will help her analyse it.

She does know a rather skilled Potioneer, but she will untangle this mystery herself.

* * *

Hermione meets Snape at his home.

Not Spinner’s End, but the place he moved after the war, once he was free: a semi-detached house in Berwick-upon-Tweed with chipped render and a potions garden. From his doorstep, she can see the North Sea.

It feels like him, this place, with the salt-scented air and distant crashing of waves. She has been here before, though she never stayed the night.

“Come in,” he says as he opens the door. “I’ll just be a moment.”

He is wearing black, tightly buttoned robes, as always. The same style he has been wearing since he was a teacher. Hermione should have expected that he wouldn’t go to any special effort for Slughorn’s party.

There are new titles crammed into the many bookshelves, and the sofa is different, but otherwise, it all looks the same. They once sat in front of that big stone fireplace, warming their toes, drinking tea and talking about all of their favourite books.

The house feels hot after her frosty walk from the apparition point, so Hermione removes her coat while she waits. As she paces towards the bookshelves, a ghostly stag bounds into the room.

“Hermione,” it says in Harry’s voice. “Ron says you’re alive, but I am starting to have my doubts. It’s been ages since we heard from you. Hope you’re okay.”

Guilt curdles in her stomach. It _has_ been too long since she caught up with Harry. Drawing her wand, she conjures her seal Patronus and sends it on its way with a promise to visit Harry soon.

“I thought your Patronus was an otter,” Snape says.

Hermione starts, bringing a hand to her chest. “God. Do you remember how I used to threaten to make you wear a bell so you couldn’t sneak up on me like that?”

“Vividly.” His expression is too neutral. It reminds Hermione of the time he let her use Legilimency to inspect his Occlumency shields. A perfect mask. He could throw any emotion on that blank face and make it believable. “When did your Patronus change?”

“Oh. Erm.” She doesn’t want to say _eight years ago_. He will read too much into it—see a confession that is not there. “Not sure. Sometime after the war.”

“I see.” His gaze drifts from her face down to the suit she chose for the occasion. It’s the one she was wearing the first time they stumbled into a broom cupboard together. He clears his throat. “How is Crookshanks?”

“Much better. Thank you.”

He nods. “I make that potion frequently for Mrs Norris. I had the ingredients on hand.”

“Make? Present tense? She’s stillalive?”

“Very much so, to the consternation of the latest generation of misbehaving students.” 

“I bet.” Reaching into her pocket, Hermione retrieves the vial of Audrey’s potion. “Speaking of potions, I got this from Audrey’s house. I ran a thorough analysis on it, and I think she added shredded ranunculus to the Elixir to Induce Euphoria that you found there before. In a couple of weeks, after it has matured—well, you know what will happen. Blistering Leaf Poison.”

Blistering Leaf Poison is odourless, tasteless, and produces a prolonged, extremely painful death. It is also notoriously difficult to trace. Healers, upon examining a victim of Blistering Leaf, almost always rule the death to be of natural causes. Brewing it is somewhat dangerous; there is a risk of toxic fumes if the ingredients are not measured precisely. Audrey was fortunate to get it right.

Only simple things that Percy taught her, indeed.

Snape takes the vial, holding it up to the light and narrowing his eyes. “I believe you are right.”

He returns the vial to her, and Hermione blinks. That’s it?

“You aren’t going to analyse it yourself?” she asks.

“Do you think your analysis flawed in any way?” When she shakes her head, he stares at the place where her Patronus vanished before motioning towards the wide fireplace. “Well, then. Shall we?”


	10. Chapter 10

_Previously: “Do you think your analysis flawed in any way?” When she shakes her head, he stares at the place where her Patronus vanished before motioning towards the wide fireplace. “Well, then. Shall we?”_

* * *

They Floo into Slughorn’s grand entryway—all crystal chandeliers and mirror-polished surfaces. Someone Hermione thinks she recognises from school—Marcus Something?—takes their coats and directs them to the lounge, where people are mingling before dinner is served.

The high ceiling has been charmed to resemble the Great Hall of Hogwarts, though the night sky above them bears little resemblance to the one outside. Slughorn chose an image of the Northern Lights to flicker overhead. 

Searching for the safe harbour of a familiar face, Hermione lands on a trio near one of the diamond-paned windows: Minerva, Ron, and Lavender. Thank goodness.

As Hermione and Snape approach, Ron removes his arm from around Lavender’s waist and digs in his pocket. It must have an Undetectable Expansion Charm of some description, because he produces what looks like a large plastic thermos. His other pocket is normal, inasmuch as it does not appear to be charmed, but he does pull a fork from it. Not _entirely_ normal.

“Ron,” Lavender hisses. “What are you doing?”

Ron opens the thermos before he replies. Steam rises up, carrying with it the aroma of carbs and cheese. Digging his fork into the cheesy mess within, he shrugs one shoulder.

“I’ve been to these parties before, babe,” he says. “I told you, the food is rubbish. I didn’t have time to eat beforehand, so I packed a few things.”

“A few things,” Lavender echoes in a flat voice.

“I’ve got a bacon sarnie in my jacket pocket.” He takes a bite of the stuff from the thermos. “You want some cheesy noodles, babe?”

At least, Hermione assumes he says _cheesy noodles_. With his mouth full, it sounds like _cheesy boodles_. 

“For the love of…” Lavender mutters. “I can’t take you anywhere.”

“I cannot decide whether I am horrified or reluctantly impressed at your shamelessness,” Minerva says.

Ron gives her a lopsided grin. “Both?”

“No, I believe I will stick with simply horrified, thank you.” 

Snape almost cracks a smile at this. His lips twitch in the same way they used to when Hermione teased him. Hermione doesn’t want to feel homesick for him. It won’t lead anywhere good. Turning away from him, she makes the mistake of catching Slughorn’s gaze across the room. Slughorn approaches them, beaming a false smile.

“Hermione!” he says. “I’m so glad you decided to come.”

Beyond a stiff nod in Snape’s direction, Slughorn does not acknowledge Snape’s presence. It’s like a time turner, spinning her back eight years. 

_And, well, there are things you don’t know about him, my girl. I would strongly advise you to end this thing with him._

If Snape is surprised by Hermione taking his hand, he doesn’t show it. He laces his fingers together with hers without missing a beat. 

“We wouldn’t have missed it,” she says, and even if she was as skilled an actor as Snape or Lavender, there is no way she could not make such a lie ring true.

“Glad to hear it,” Slughorn says. “And how is your detective agency doing?”

“It’s doing well, thank you.” _His reputation will hold you back._ “Though not nearly as well as Severus’s business.”

Slughorn has heard all about Snape’s business. How could he have avoided it? He flashes the expected smile in Snape’s vague direction and says it’s all _very good, very good_. He even asks Snape about a new potion the company recently patented, but Slughorn has this way of looking right through him. It’s the same way his sycophantic stare unfocused around Neville—the way he used to forget Ron’s name and call him Ralph or Rupert.

Now that Ron and Neville are war heroes, Slughorn can’t get enough of them. Hermione frowns. Snape is a war hero, too. They could not have won it without him. 

Hermione squeezes Snape’s hand. He squeezes back.

* * *

The dinner crawls by, full of tedious small talk and bizarre food. If not for concerns about food hygiene, Severus would ask Ronald for some of that bacon sandwich.

As Marcus Belby drones on longer than one of Granger’s essays, the only thing Severus can think is _seal_. Not just any seal. A harbour seal.

Granger—Hermione—fuck, he doesn’t know what to call her. If she guessed that Màiri is his cousin, she would have said something. She would have made the obvious connection, but she doesn’t know. She hasn’t guessed what he is. She doesn’t know how thoroughly another person could control him if he let his guard down.

When the party moves back to the lounge, he grabs Hermione’s arm, the way he used to at Order functions to signal that he wanted her alone.

“Shall we explore?” he whispers in her ear. 

He catches her sharp intake of breath.

“All right,” she says. 

If they are missed, Slughorn knows what they used to be. He will assume they wandered off to fuck in one of his spare rooms. A malevolent thrill ripples through Severus at the thought of Slughorn’s annoyance.

They slip out of the dining room and into a long, narrow corridor. Several doors branch off from it, and Severus knows from chatting with Minerva that this ridiculous house has an east wing and a west wing. If he and Hermione were sneaking off for something far more appealing than their current mission, they would have no shortage of options for a location.

Severus knows what a Hogwarts professor’s pension looks like, and it is nowhere near enough to fund this.

The door of the first room on the left is wide open. It’s the kitchen, where Slughorn’s elf still toils away. Peeking around the door frame, Hermione waits for the perfect moment to motion for them to tiptoe past. Not a floorboard creaks, and they make it past without the elf taking notice.

They should split up, double the ground they can cover in their limited time, but Hermione touches his arm and beckons for him to follow her up the stairs at the end of the hall.

“If we’re going to find anything,” she whispers, “I think it’s more likely to be far away from the guests.”

“I think you underestimate how much Slughorn values convenience.”

“Hmm. Fair point.”

She goes first. Severus doesn’t intend to stare at her arse as they climb the stairs, but he doesn’t exactly try to avert his gaze, either. Why is she wearing _that suit_?

The upstairs landing smells strangely like those sugary coffee drinks that Hermione orders in cafes. They make it through two spare bedrooms, finding nothing more interesting than a fluffy dressing gown that was possibly stolen from a wizarding hotel in Paris, before heavy footfalls sound on the stairs.

Severus does not believe in fate, but if he did, he would laugh at himself for not seeing this coming the instant Hermione turned up on his doorstep in that suit. As quietly as he can, he yanks her through a nearby door. They find themselves in a tiny room, jostling against each other as they battle for space with cleaning supplies.

A broom cupboard. Again.

 _Muffliato_ , he thinks, letting the spell flow silently through his fingers. _Colloportus_. 

Voices filter through the door: both male, one definitely Slughorn. He’s offering a spare room to someone who overindulged on the free drinks. Belby. A mediocre Potions student whom Severus would not remember at all, if not for his relation to the inventor of Wolfsbane.

“Here we are, Marcus,” Slughorn says. “You know where everything is.”

A slurred reply, too low to make out.

“Yes, well. Let’s be more careful next time, hmm?”

Slughorn’s footsteps fade away down the stairs, but Belby hasn’t closed the door of the room across the hall. He stumbles around, cursing under his breath.

As they wait, Severus is acutely aware of how Hermione’s soft, familiar body is pressed against him. Years ago, he knows how they would have passed the time. Now, when he looks at her, she stares back like it’s a challenge.

Well. The truth can be used to one’s advantage, when properly applied.

“Do you want to know why I hired you?” he whispers. “It was an excuse. It gave me a reason to show you how successful I’ve become—how wrong Slughorn was about me.”

She expected more evasion if the topic came up again, he is sure. Half-truths, anything but a straight answer. It catches her so off-guard that she laughs. 

“The Captain Wentworth to my Anne Elliot?” she says. “Here to lord your new status over your former flame who is, _gasp_ , still single, even though she’s nearly thirty?”

“That, and the fact that the Aurors are more likely to take an accusation seriously if it comes from you.”

“I don’t think that’s true.”

He shrugs.

“Well, message received, though I already knew Slughorn was wrong about you,” she says. “I knew that eight years ago.” She tilts her chin up, that challenge returning to her stare. “Why are you still here, then?”

He is starting to suspect the answer. “Why do you think?” he asks.

It is warm in the cupboard, but she shivers. “You enjoy tormenting me?”

He chuckles. And this is neither the time nor the place, but she is so bloody close, and her Patronus is a seal, and she helped his cousin, and when he dips his head lower, she does not back away. She lets him brush his lips against hers. She opens her mouth for him, and, _fuck_ , he has missed her. His hands still fit on her hips. Her fingers still reach around to the back of his neck to tangle in his hair. 

It is even less the time and the place for wandering too far down memory lane. He cannot unfasten her trousers and touch her like he used to, whispering filth in her ear as he makes her come. Not now.

Perhaps not ever, because Hermione places her hands on his chest and gently pushes away.

“Wait,” she says. “Okay.” She lets out a jagged sigh. “Why did you leave? We weren’t just… We were more than sneaking off together.”

Severus tilts his forehead against hers. They were. 

“It had to do with trust,” he says. His utter lack of trust in anyone, mostly. And his all-consuming fear at how close he came to revealing all of himself to her. “I have started to wonder whether I was mistaken.”

“ _Started._ ” She scoffs. “Why was that one thing enough to break your trust?”

This is not the time and place for this, either. He doesn’t know what the time and place for this conversation might be.

“Not here,” he says with an almost apologetic squeeze of her hips. “Later.”

She turns her head, breathing in deep, then freezes.

“Severus? What does that smell like to you?”

Severus sniffs. Whatever it is, it’s faint. The dominant scent is the gingerbread-laced coffee he noticed before. Layered beneath it is old parchment, citrus, and the sea.

His eyebrows shoot up. The Wizengamot outlawed the source of that scent quite some time ago.

“Amortentia.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There will be no update next week, I'm afraid. 💗 I didn't plan to leave it on a cliffhanger over the holidays, but here we are. Happy holidays, here's a cliff for you to dangle on. Love, Turtle.


	11. Chapter 11

_Previously: Severus sniffs. Whatever it is, it’s faint. The dominant scent is the gingerbread-laced coffee he noticed before. Layered beneath it is old parchment, citrus, and the sea._

_His eyebrows shoot up. The Wizengamot outlawed the source of that scent quite some time ago._

_“Amortentia.”_

* * *

The door across the hall finally clicks shut, but Hermione can barely hear anything over her own pounding heart. Snape is too close. He isn’t close enough.

He _kissed_ her. She asked why he was still here, and that was his answer: a kiss. Was it his answer, or was he only trying to shut her up? It worked. He kissed her, and she kissed him back.

She breathes in deep, and there it is again: freshly cut grass, parchment, potions ingredients. What the hell is Slughorn playing at?

“Percy worked in magical imports,” she says. “What if he caught someone smuggling the ingredients for Amortentia, and…”

The rest of the sentence sticks in her throat. Snape’s hands are still on her hips; his thumbs brush back and forth against her waist. Almost like an attempt at comfort.

“It is a possibility,” he says, and the tone of his voice flips that switch in her mind—the one that makes her change to past tense when thinking about Percy.

If Slughorn did have something to do with Percy and Oliver’s disappearances, Hermione is going to catch him. She will see him locked up in Azkaban. No more sprawling mansion. 

Easing the door open, she steps into the hall. Snape is close behind, a smear of her lipstick decorating his mouth. They follow that intoxicating scent, eventually finding a heavily warded door. The magic emanating from it is unpleasant—as oily as Slughorn’s smile. Both Hermione and Snape test their magic against it, teasing at the corners, trying to find a weak spot, but it is no use. In an empty house, it would be no problem, but…

“I don’t think we can remove the wards without alerting Slughorn,” Hermione says.

“I agree. And while I believe either of us could best him in a duel, it is perhaps not the most prudent course of action with a house full of witnesses.”

She can’t help it. She laughs. “Implying you would have no qualms about going right ahead if Slughorn was on his own?”

“Obviously.”

The Aurors can’t search without a warrant, and in order to obtain that, they will need more proof than Hermione and Snape’s senses of smell.

“Maybe we should get back,” she says. “We were in that cupboard for quite a while. How long can we stay up here without raising suspicion?”

“How long did we disappear at Order functions?”

Hermione raises her eyebrows. “No idea. I always lost track of time.”

His low chuckle takes her back to those stolen moments. “Yes. As did I.”

Hauling him into the broom cupboard for more kisses and explanations is a bad idea, but it crosses her mind all the same. She imagines them as they used to be: tangled together in a spare room, his robes rough against her thighs, one hand clamped over her mouth to hush her moans. She imagines them as they could be: all secrets laid bare, his robes on the floor next to hers, candlelight flickering as she kisses teasing paths over skin she has never seen.

“We will return another time,” he says, snapping her out of the daydream. No teasing today. “Shall we?”

She almost reaches up and wipes the smudge of red lipstick from the corner of his mouth with the pad of her thumb. Like they are still together, still sneaking off at parties. Instead, she offers him a tissue from her suit jacket pocket. It doesn’t remove the mark entirely, but it looks as if they made an effort. Waltzing back in with messy hair, rumpled clothing, and lipstick kisses all over his face would make it seem as if they were trying to seem as if they’d been doing… exactly what they had been doing.

This is work. A case. Nothing more. 

Back downstairs, no one reacts to their reappearance. Slughorn is busy, chatting to some Quidditch player. Hermione’s stomach turns at his grin. Taking Snape’s hand again, she leads him back to the corner where Minerva, Lavender, and Ron are gathered.

“No dessert hiding in your pockets?” Hermione asks when she finds Ron with no contraband food.

“Nah,” he says. “Not anymore. You missed it. Didn’t want to go overboard. I just had a few mince pies.”

Lavender’s expression says it was more than a few. Not that Hermione can blame him. After the bizarre starter of chicken blancmange (two things which should never, ever be combined), she wished she’d brought her own food. 

As the party stretches on, Hermione eventually finds herself alone with Lavender—Ron, Snape, and Minerva having been drawn into a conversation with someone Hermione has never met about the Expansion Charms on Ron’s pockets.

“So,” Lavender says, “I’m thinking of breaking up with Ron.”

Hermione laughs. “Again.”

“Pockets full of food, Hermione. Pockets. Full. Of. Food.”

“If you didn’t see something as obvious as that coming, then maybe you’re in the wrong field.”

“Hmm. Fair.”

Slughorn sidles up to them, plate on mince pies (clearly inferior to Ron’s pocket mince pies) in hand, his bushy moustache full of crumbs. Like that Order party eight years ago, when the oil dripped from Hermione’s lamp and she got caught.

“I must say, I’m surprised to see you falling back into old habits, my dear,” he says to Hermione.

An angry blush creeps up the back of her neck and burns her face. Clenching her hands into fists behind her back as she tries to swallow her loathing, she fakes a smile.

“Only the habits that are good for me,” she says.

Warmth presses against her side: Snape, moving close and placing a hand on her waist. _Oh_. He heard. His touch is easy—casual, like they do this all the time, and he never stopped touching her eight years ago. She leans into him.

Slughorn looks as if he pities her. Good. Let him write her off as no longer worth his time. He will regret it.

* * *

Severus’s jaw is sore from grinding his teeth by the time he and Hermione finally Floo back to his house. Being around Slughorn always sets him on edge. Slughorn knows that if he dared to spread Severus’s personal business around the wizarding world, Severus would make him pay, but is that enough of a deterrent? Severus curses Albus, yet again.

“You are safe here,” Albus once said, his blue eyes too kind, too gentle to make an eleven-year-old Severus anything but uneasy. “There is nothing to fear from sharing everything with your Head of House and Madam Pomfrey.”

Lupin likely received a similar speech, but _he_ got Minerva. Neither she nor Poppy would ever use such information against a student.

There is no point in dwelling on what might have been, but Severus often wonders how his interactions with Slughorn might have gone if Severus refused Albus’s request. Would Slughorn have felt the need to warn Hermione against associating with him?

Probably. 

Severus has spent some time making this house comfortable, painting and decorating until it is nothing like Spinner’s End, but after the opulence of Slughorn’s grand manor, it feels shabby. He stands near the bland sofa, forcing an equally bland expression on his face as Hermione fiddles with a button on her suit jacket.

Waiting for her to speak is like teetering on some invisible edge—the same jittery breathlessness that soured his stomach and made his skin feel too tight the day he finally found that chest and set his mother free. Back in the broom cupboard, he told Hermione he would answer her questions later. _Later_ has arrived.

“Slughorn’s alibi for the night Oliver went missing is airtight,” she finally says. “He was out of the country, just like he was when Percy vanished, but if Slughorn was involved in some way, he wouldn’t actually do it himself, would he?”

Her choice of subject doesn’t calm him. If anything, his feet slip closer to the crumbling cliff edge. 

“I very much doubt it,” he says. “Being the only one in his operation who can brew Amortentia would make him feel big and important, but he would have someone to do the more unsavoury work for him.”

She nods. “And if he’s selling Amortentia, he doesn’t peddle it himself. Smith bought it from a dealer; he didn’t know where it came from. He told me if he’d known the source, he would’ve made a plea bargain, and that person would’ve been the one in Azkaban.” Pausing, she wrinkles her nose. “Who was that person Slughorn let into the spare room? Marcus Someone. Do you know him?”

“Marcus Belby. Ravenclaw. A mediocre student with remarkable relatives.”

Her eyes light up the way they used to when she read something fascinating and couldn’t wait to share it with him. “Damocles Belby’s nephew! Slughorn invited him to the Slug Club, but Marcus ended up being a disappointment, since he wasn’t in touch with his uncle.”

Typical. “Slughorn has always had two types of people he recruits,” Severus says. “Those who can help him touch fame, and those he can use for other purposes.”

Hermione paces towards one of the bookshelf-lined walls, winding a curl around one of her fingers, the way she always does when she is deep in thought. “Do you think Audrey and her poison brewing fit into this, somehow?” she asks. “Maybe it’s for… I don’t know. Some attempt at protecting herself? She told her friend she was scared. Maybe Audrey and Slughorn are both scared. Could he have been pressured into brewing Amortentia? He’s so concerned about appearances. I can’t imagine him taking the risk of getting caught.”

Bitterness sweeps through him. “I doubt Slughorn thinks for one second that he is in any danger of getting caught. I wasn’t the only Slytherin to play both sides during the war.”

“Oh. Well. Yeah, I can see that, actually.”

Severus doesn’t entirely catch what she says next—something about talking to Potter and getting someone to watch the Department of Magical Imports. He is too distracted by the way she leans against the bookcase. Years ago, she reached overhead, grabbing onto one of those shelves as Severus took her roughly against that stretch of wall.

He wants to kiss her again.

“That sounds like a sensible plan,” he says when she pauses for his reaction, even though said plan seems to involve Potter. 

Silence. Biting her lower lip, Hermione pushes off of the wall.

“I should go,” she says. “I’ll let you know when I have any news.”

And it is still _later_ , but perhaps she no longer wants his explanations. Perhaps the ghostly white seal that dashed through this room earlier does not mean what he thinks it means.

Once she is gone, Severus passes his wand from left hand to right and back again. How long has it been since he cast a Patronus? Since the war, most likely. Holding the memory of the first time he saw the sea in his mind, he raises his wand.

“Expecto Patronum.”

The animal that appears is sleeker and much smaller than the doe. It swims around him in a circle, playful and delighted.

An otter. Of course.

Fuck.


	12. Chapter 12

_Previously: “Expecto Patronum.”_

_The animal that appears is sleeker and much smaller than the doe. It swims around him in a circle, playful and delighted._

_An otter. Of course._

_Fuck._

* * *

Minerva doesn’t arrive without warning—it is not her way—but Hermione is nevertheless surprised to see a tabby cat with square markings around its eyes lounging in the garden with Crookshanks. Both cats perk up, turning towards the sea as a seal leaps above the waves. Balancing on the low stone wall at the bottom of the garden, Crooks yowls at the seal. Whether he is giving it a piece of his mind or inviting it for tea, Hermione cannot tell. Scolding and pleading sound identical in Crookshanks’s creaky voice.

The Minerva-cat hops down from the wall, transforming back into a witch in tartan robes. She greets Hermione with one of her rare smiles. It wasn’t long ago that they last saw each other, but that was at Slughorn’s party. Hermione couldn’t talk freely there.

Not that she can talk freely about everything on her mind, but it is pleasant to stroll with Minerva through Kirkwall. The sea wind is less bitter than usual today, not slicing through Hermione’s coat and stealing her breath. 

They talk of Hermione’s work—the few bits and pieces she can share—and how things are going at Hogwarts. Minerva doesn’t like the new Potions professor. No surprise, there. Since the end of the war, none of the people to fill the position have been adequate in Minerva’s eyes. 

Turning onto the high street, they almost collide with a woman who is hauntingly familiar to Hermione, though she can’t pinpoint how they know each other. Perhaps the familiarity can be blamed on the fact that her dark hair, heavy brows, and large nose remind her of Snape. God, now she’s seeing him everywhere.

“Well, hello, stranger,” Minerva says, almost beaming at the woman. “How have you been?”

The woman, when she says that she has been well enough, thank you, speaks with a Scottish accent that is a little softer than Minerva’s. Faded at the edges, like it has been left out in the sun.

The woman’s pale cheeks turn pink as she and Minerva do an awkward dance of trying to work out whether they should shake hands or embrace. 

“Aunt Eileen,” another woman shouts from farther down the road, interrupting Minerva as she starts to introduce Hermione. It’s Màiri, Hermione's former client. “I’m sorry to pull you away, but we’re going to be late. Oh, hi, Hermione. Hi, Professor.”

Hermione gives a halfhearted wave, white noise roaring in her ears. Eileen. Snape’s mother? If she is, and Màiri is her niece, then…

“Was that Snape’s mum?” Hermione asks Minerva once the other woman has dashed apologetically off to her appointment.

“Yes.” Minerva chuckles. “He does take after her just a bit, doesn’t he? Eileen and I went to school together.”

Minerva keeps talking, but Hermione hears none of it. 

Snape is a selkie.

When Hermione and Màiri first met, Màiri was a hunched, miserable ghost of a woman. She hired Hermione to find her cloak—the one her now-ex-husband stole. Hours of researching selkies followed, in typical Hermione fashion. All of that information threatens to fly out of her head at the shock of this revelation. She has to slow her breaths, concentrate on each inhale and exhale to get her wits about her.

What does she know for certain? Selkies’ cloaks allow them to transform into seals. Stealing the cloak traps them on land and prevents them from ever leaving. A perfectly legal course of action, according to the Ministry. The Wizengamot thinks it is absolutely fine and natural for witches and wizards to imprison their partners.

“Are you all right, Hermione?” Minerva asks.

“Yes, fine, sorry. Just a bit distracted. Thinking about a case.”

Forcing her jaw to unclench, she puts her fury at the Ministry to one side for the moment. What else does she know? Snape never fully removed his clothing in her presence. Why? Selkies don’t have any identifying marks. Perhaps he keeps his cloak hidden somewhere about his person, and he didn’t want to set it to one side. 

_It had to do with trust_ , he said in the broom cupboard at Slughorn’s party. Did he think she wouldn’t trust him to stay? Did he imagine waking from a night in her bed, saltwater calling him home, only to find his cloak mysteriously gone and his body bound to dry land—bound to her? Or did he think she would tell the world, make him vulnerable to being trapped by others? Her eyes sting. 

She remembers his expression in that spare room at Grimmauld Place eight years ago, when she asked if she would ever see him without his robes. That soft smile, hinting at all sorts of future possibilities.

She remembers his expression when he overheard her tell Slughorn they were nothing. That furious glower, promising they were through forever.

And Slughorn… _There are things you don’t know about him, my girl_. Snape heard that, too. Does Slughorn know? 

And what the hell is she going to do now? Should she tell Snape that she knows?

Hermione almost stops in the middle of the pavement. Oh, no. Snape is a selkie, and her Patronus is a seal. And he _saw_.

Shite.

* * *

Severus holds the vial of Polyjuice Potion up to the light. It looks adequate. The boomslang skin was clearly not sliced against the grain, as he would have done, but it was shredded finely enough. Still, it doesn’t feel like one of Hermione’s potions. There are slight variations from the standard instructions. Little quirks that Hermione would never permit.

“Did you brew this?” he asks. 

“No, Lavender did.”

He sets it back on her desk.

“Oi!” Miss Brown says from the doorway. “I saw that, Professor.”

“You were meant to.”

Hermione laughs. “Lavender is a perfectly competent brewer. She just needed instruction.”

Severus glowers. 

There is something off about her responding smirk. It’s gentler, more uncertain than he expects. There has been something off about her ever since he arrived. Like she wants to tell him a secret, but cannot find the words. Receiving the fire-call asking if he wished to accompany her was enough of a surprise. What else does she have in store for him?

Miss Brown transfigures her pink robes into a Muggle dress with a wave of her wand. “I’m off,” she says. “Wish me luck.”

“Good luck.” Hermione frowns. “And be _careful_.”

With a tinkling laugh, Miss Brown shrugs one shoulder. “I’ll be fine. Stop worrying so much.”

“If you tell me that your tea leaves showed it going well, so help me—”

“They did, for your information, but honestly, what’s the worst that could happen?”

Hermione scoffs. “Audrey poisons you and leaves your body on my doorstep as a warning?” 

“God, you’re so morbid. Audrey and I are friends now. I really can’t imagine her hurting me. I’ll get to the bottom of this; you’ll see.”

Miss Brown kisses Hermione’s cheek then turns on her heel, skirt flaring out as she Disapparates.

Glancing at Severus, Hermione catches her lower lip between her teeth. Is she finally going to say whatever is on her mind?

Apparently not. Dropping a blonde hair into her own vial of Polyjuice, she raises the resulting turquoise potion as if toasting his health. Severus watches her transformation into a middle-aged Muggle woman. Her skin is ruddy, as if she has caught the sun. Combined with her secondhand hiking clothes and Ordnance Survey map, it gives the perfect impression of a Muggle tourist.

As Hermione is neither dead nor covered in painful boils, Severus decides that his assessment of Miss Brown’s potion was correct: adequate. His own vial turns a brilliant purple when the ginger hair is added.

He hates the crushing pain of Polyjuice transformation, but it is the taste he truly dreads. This one is a mixture of Marmite and pineapple. Disgusting.

“You look like a Weasley,” is the first thing Hermione says to him. “Well, I guess that’s my fault for letting Lavender get the hair.”

His borrowed face is clearly defective, because the glare he sends her way does not make her retract her comparison.

“Shall we?” she asks.

Severus places a hand on her arm, and the force of her Apparition squeezes around him. They land in a secluded grove of trees, just off of a public footpath somewhere in Yorkshire. The path runs alongside Marcus Belby’s property. Should Belby take them by surprise, Hermione thinks it will be perfectly feasible to pass themselves off as bumbling Muggles who took a wrong turn. They can wave the map around a bit, ask to use his phone, then storm off in a huff when he refuses.

“And if Belby has anti-Muggle wards?” he asks.

She shrugs. “Then we Disillusion ourselves and Stun and Obliviate him if we get caught.”

Severus used to assume it was Potter and Weasley who encouraged Hermione to break the rules when they were students. Now he knows better. 

“I told you he was supposed to be out, anyway,” she says. “He visits his gran every Sunday.”

“How… _sweet_.”

“Hey, it doesn’t mean he isn’t a dangerous criminal. Even the Dark Lord had a grandmother.”

She remembers his aversion to hearing the name Voldemort. When Hermione and Severus were together, he always gritted his teeth out of habit, waiting for the searing pain that used to tear through his Dark Mark whenever anyone spoke the name in his presence.

“Yes,” Severus says. “And he brutally slaughtered her. But I agree: Belby’s family life likely reveals very little about his criminal activities.”

“Lavender is still working on finding the right people for us to impersonate in order to speak to him without raising his suspicions. He was a Ravenclaw, so we’re hoping Luna can help point us in the right direction.”

_Us_. Will Severus be involved in that endeavour as well?

Holding the map in front of her face, Hermione pushes her sunglasses up to rest on the top of her head. “Come on, _Reginald_ ,” she says. “I’m sure it’s this way.”

“Very well, _Florence_ ,” he says with a roll of his eyes.

Miss Brown chose their aliases. 

There are no anti-Muggle wards, it turns out. Lazy. Ignoring the multiple signs that say, “Private property, no right of way,” Severus and Hermione turn off of the path and onto a sloping drive that leads up to a stone cottage.

A lake runs along the back of the property, the water dark and mirror-smooth. Bodies of water usually calm Severus, but something about this lake makes the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. 

Hermione’s silent Homenum Revelio swoops over him. She nods, satisfied. There are no other people nearby. Belby is out, as planned. Raising their cameras, they part at the front door, aiming the zoom lenses at the windows and searching for anything useful. Severus finds papers scattered over the dining room table; a quick wave of his wand makes the curtain move aside so he can get a better angle.

Around the side of the house, a large eagle-owl perches on one of the windowsills, waiting for Belby. In a move he mastered during the war, Severus casts Geminio on the scroll in its claws, catches the copy, and throws up a shield to stop the owl from clawing him. It beats its wings against the shield a few times before giving up and moving to one of the upstairs windowsills.

Unrolling the copy, Severus reads the message.

_Tuesday, 10 PM._

_— A_

Well. That’s interesting.

“Anything useful?” Hermione asks.

“Potentially.” Slipping the scroll into his pocket, he turns to face her. “Did you bring me along to try to discourage me from coming here on my own?”

“No. I already gave you my opinion of you doing that sort of thing.”

She doesn’t look at him the same way she did in the alley, when she asked why he hired her: all challenge and fury. This look asks him a different question—the same one that stuck in her throat back in her office.

“Then why am I here?” he asks.

“I wanted to talk to you about something. Not _here_ , but..”

She takes a step closer, but the ghostly white form of a small dog leaps into her path.

“Come quickly,” the Patronus says in Ronald Weasley’s voice. “Lavender is in St Mungo’s.”


	13. Chapter 13

_Previously: She takes a step closer, but the ghostly white form of a small dog leaps into her path._

_“Come quickly,” it says in Ronald Weasley’s voice. “Lavender is in St Mungo’s.”_

* * *

Lavender sits propped up by several pillows in her hospital bed, checking her reflection in a compact mirror and touching up her lipstick. The left side of her face, from her forehead down to her jaw, is painted bright yellow with bruise paste. The breath that is trapped under the lump in Hermione’s throat comes out in a shaky exhale. Lavender is alive.

“What happened?” Hermione asks. She wants to throw herself at Lavender and wrap her in a tight hug, but she doesn’t know what might be sore, what might be broken. She settles for sweeping a bit of Lavender’s hair back from her face, tucking it behind her ear. Her Polyjuiced hands look rough against the soft blonde curls.

“It’s my own fault,” Lavender says. “I was distracted, trying to make sure I didn’t lose her, and I didn’t look both ways before I crossed the street. I feel so bad for the boy who was driving. Probably traumatised for life.” Wincing, she gestures at her hospital gown clad body. “And now I sit here and wait for the Skele-gro to do its thing.”

“You’re going to be all right, though?”

“Yeah, by tomorrow I’ll be fine.”

Lavender’s gaze lands on Hermione’s other hand, and Hermione realises with a start that her fingers are still laced together with Snape’s. He led the Apparition to St Mungo’s. Hermione did not let go of him as they rushed through the sterile corridors to the ward where Lavender is being treated.

Even with Lavender staring, Hermione doesn’t drop his hand immediately. She gives his fingers a gentle squeeze first—a silent _thank you_ for anchoring her as worry threatened to sweep her away.

Hermione hates the smell of this place—the antiseptic sting left behind by multiple Cleaning Charms. It reminds her of coming here right after the war, visiting the wounded. She visited Snape here. Sat by his bed and knitted a blanket with a Warming Charm, since he always looked cold. She can’t think too much about seeing him during those long months, unconscious and pale, or her throat goes tight. Madam Pomfrey demanded to take over his care herself. Hermione hadn’t thought much about it at the time, but now she wonders. Was it because Madam Pomfrey knows he’s a selkie?

Years later, as Hermione and Severus lounged on a bed at Grimmauld Place, sweaty and sated, she asked about the blanket. He still had it. 

“Hey, babe,” Ron says as he approaches Lavender’s bedside. Reaching into an extendable pocket, he produces a large pink box. “I sneaked this in for you, by the way. The food here is _rank_.”

When Lavender opens the box, she finds a chocolate cake. Not a _slice_ of cake. He brought her an _entire_ chocolate cake.

Lavender lets out a dreamy little sigh. “Thanks, Ron.” Leaning closer to Hermione, she adds in a whisper, “I’m going to end up marrying him, aren’t I?”

“Quite possibly.”

“Damn. Well, he’ll make a decent first husband, I suppose.”

Ron throws up a Muffliato, protecting everything behind the curtains that shelter Lavender’s bed from its neighbours. Snape’s lip curls, but he makes no comment at seeing his spell used by Ron. Not when he and Hermione are both seized by the transformation from Reginald and Florence back to their normal selves.

“Did you two find anything useful?” Ron asks once they’ve caught their breath and transfigured their hiking attire into wizarding robes. 

Snape’s robes are a perfect replica of his usual attire. He changes khaki fabric and multiple pockets to long rows of buttons and sweeping black robes with a silent pass of his hand, not bothering with his wand.

Thank Merlin the ward is mostly empty. The only other occupant is a sleeping witch a few beds over from Lavender. Hermione didn’t think about the Polyjuice wearing off when they came here; her focus was entirely on her friend.

“I found something potentially interesting,” Snape says, “though it was too late to be of use to Miss Brown.”

He tells them about a letter to Marcus Belby that was signed with the initial _A_. Audrey? Maybe.

“I still don’t think Audrey has anything to do with any of this stuff,” Lavender says, “but I agree; we should look into it. I’ll get started searching for anyone in Percy’s old department at the ministry whose name starts with A, in case that theory is correct.”

Snape nods. “I apologise for being slow to warn you about the potential danger, Miss Brown.” Picking up the Pain Relieving Potion on her bedside table, he gives it a sniff. “I will provide something better than _this_ , if Mr Weasley wishes to sneak it to you in one of his pockets.”

Hermione’s heart gives a strange leap in her chest. For reasons she cannot—or does not want to—fathom, Lavender smirks.

“We should let you get some rest,” Hermione eventually says. 

Frowning, Lavender swallows her mouthful of chocolate cake. “All right. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“You will do no such thing. You’re taking the day off.”

It is moments like this that make Hermione wish for the ability to send a letter to her younger self. Sixteen-year-old Hermione Granger would never, ever believe that she would one day have to talk her best friend _Lavender Brown_ out of doing work after a hospital stay. And that isn’t even getting into Past Hermione’s reaction to everything to do with Hermione and Snape.

On their way out of the hospital, Hermione wants to take Snape’s hand again. Her arms tremble, pent-up adrenaline shouting for a release. If they were still… whatever they used to be, he would study her with one of those long, piercing looks of his and then take her to his house without a word. 

Reclining on the sofa, he would tell her what to do. _Take your clothes off. Touch yourself. Come here_. Her mind would go fantastically blank as she climbed into his lap, as he whispered how good she felt—how good she _was_. Bit by bit, the tight ball of tension in her chest would unravel. Slamming his hips against hers, he would call her perfect.

As they walk through the corridors of St Mungo’s, her hands stay at her sides. The only sounds are the hum of Life-Support Charms, hushed conversations, and the clack of high heels moving closer to them.

“Severus? Hermione?” a familiar voice says. “I thought that was you.”

The owner of the voice is tall—almost as tall as Severus. Statuesque. A teenage Hermione always envied her dark, shiny, smooth hair. Out of habit, Hermione almost calls her Professor Vector.

“Septima,” Snape says, and the way he smiles twists a knife in Hermione’s stomach. 

“What are you two doing here together?” Professor Vec— _Septima_ asks.

“Visiting a patient,” Severus replies before Hermione can. “I hope you aren’t here because you’re unwell?”

Since when is he so bloody polite? She has never seen him make small talk. He finds it tedious.

“No, I’m fine.” Septima tucks a lock of that shiny hair behind her ear. “Visiting my uncle.”

Septima asks the expected questions about what Hermione has been up to, but Hermione gets the feeling that only Severus is included in Septima’s request to _catch up sometime_. Well. He is a successful, single, war hero—as he came to Kirkwall to rub in Hermione’s face. The Captain Wentworth to her Anne Elliot. 

Snape murmurs something that might be an agreement. After Septima leaves her new Floo address with him, he turns to Hermione.

“Did you still wish to talk to me about something?”

* * *

Hermione retreats to the bookshelf in Severus’s lounge, like the last time, resting her back against it as if drawing strength from the familiar pages. She takes a deep breath, and Severus feels as if he teeters on the edge of a cliff. No matter how he tries to correct his balance, she is going to speak and he is going to topple over the edge. Nothing good could take so long for her to get out.

“I met your mother,” she finally says. “Well, we weren’t actually introduced. She had to run off, but… She was with Màiri.”

Ah. Severus fights against the instinctive clenching of his jaw, keeping his expression calm and even.

“Did you?” he says.

“Màiri called her Aunt Eileen.”

Silence.

“You don’t have to tell me if… I mean. It’s none of my…” She opens and closes her mouth, as if searching for words. “It just didn’t feel right to keep it from you—what I figured out. What I think I’ve figured out. But I promise I won’t tell anyone else, and you don’t have to confirm or deny anything.”

His mother’s constant refrain comes to him in the space between breaths, leaving a bitter taste in his mouth. 

_Never tell anyone, Severus. No matter how much you think you can trust them, you can’t._

Funny that it is Eileen who has taken the choice away from him. Oh, he can make up a plausible lie, but Hermione will not believe it. She is too clever—has probably guessed at least half of his mother’s story. Hermione knows he is from Cokeworth, and her research will have told her how selkies fare that far away from the sea.

“My grandfather was a wizard,” he says. “An unremarkable one, by all accounts. When my grandmother tired of him and started spending more time at sea, he took her cloak. My mother married a Muggle, as you know, and… You can see where this is going.”

She nods. “I can. And you? Have you ever told anyone?”

“Albus was told when I started school. Poppy as well, as she was responsible for my medical care. Albus convinced me to tell my Head of House.”

“Oh.” She cringes. “That… explains some things. No one else? Did you ever tell anyone just because you wanted to?”

He pauses, swallows hard. He was always too afraid of Lily’s rejection to entertain the notion of telling her, but Hermione… It is revealing too much, giving her too much power over him, but she looks at him the way she used to, and he _wants_ to tell her. 

“Nearly.”

The word feels like a physical thing—something he drags up and hopes she will catch. Her mouth opens in a soft O, like she can feel the impact as it hits her in the chest.

What would have happened if he had told her all those years ago? Perhaps they would still be together. Would he hang his cloak next to her robes without a second thought? Come to her with salt still on his skin, trust her enough to believe anything could last forever?

“Wait,” she says, her eyebrows drawing together. “When you were a student at Hogwarts… That night Sirius sent you after Remus. He would have killed you, wouldn’t he? If you survived the attack, it wouldn’t be for long. You wouldn’t become a werewolf.”

Severus doesn’t expect this line of questioning. He was bracing for a string of guesses about why he never removed his robes in front of her. He hasn’t decided whether he will tell her that his robes _are_ the cloak. When Severus was a child, his mother transfigured his cloak into a hideous smock that he wore a large coat to disguise. A spell of her own design, impervious to a Finite. As a student, it had been his school robes. Now, it is the severe, many-buttoned robes he wore for year after tedious year of teaching and spying. During the war, he changed the cloak from robes to nightshirt every evening and slept in it, sometimes even bathing in his cloak after days of being too paranoid to let it out of his reach.

“Correct,” he says, adjusting the cuffs of his transfigured sleeves. Werewolf bites are poisonous to selkies.

He can’t take sympathy from her right now. Not about this. Again, she surprises him. Tightening her hands into fists, she juts her chin out the way she used to do when he’d done something to piss her off.

“I cannot believe he didn’t get expelled,” she says.

He tries to smirk. “I doubt that. You met Albus.”

She lets out a harsh laugh. “All right, I can _believe_ it, but you know what I mean.” 

He wants to kiss her. But she worked out his biggest secret without even trying, and he feels naked and raw. He does not step towards her—does not take her face between his hands and press his mouth to hers. Does not fall back into sliding a leg between her thighs, slipping a hand beneath her robes. He has been robbed of the choice to keep sensitive information to himself. Again.

At least it isn’t Potter shouting it in front of a crowd of Severus's former colleagues and students this time. Small mercies.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got the idea for this fic when discussing Somigliana's _excellent_ story, _The Silvering Divide_ , with Viridiantly. If you haven't read that one yet, you absolutely should.


	14. Chapter 14

_Previously: “Did you ever tell anyone just because you wanted to?”_

_He pauses, swallows hard. He was always too afraid of Lily’s rejection to entertain the notion of telling her, but Hermione… It is revealing too much, giving her too much power over him, but she looks at him the way she used to, and he wants to tell her._

_“Nearly.”_

* * *

She should have asked him again about their breakup. The opportunity was there. Everything was laid out on the table—as far as she knew, anyway. Something about the tick in his jaw made the words stay locked in her throat that night. Muttering some excuse about it being late, she let him walk her to the door. 

Now, Hermione sits behind the wheel of a hire car next to Snape. Severus? Has he become Severus to her again? He is no longer her cold, distant client, but nor is he the man she used to kiss. His posture is too rigid, like he can’t relax around her. Like he resents her for knowing what he is.

Eight years ago, she would have cleared the air by kissing his neck and trailing her fingertips up his thigh. She would have slowly moved her hand higher, waiting until he sighed and murmured her name before she unfastened his trousers and wrapped her hand around his cock. She would have watched his face the whole time, loving the way his composed exterior cracked—the way he looked completely absorbed in every stroke of her hand, like nothing else mattered. Only her touch. Only her. 

Perhaps this is why they didn’t last. Because they resolved conflicts with their bodies instead of with words.

Severus shifts in the passenger seat, and she _must_ stop thinking about touching him. He won’t look into her mind—she knows he won’t—but it feels as if her wandering thoughts are written all over her face. Not that he is looking at her. He is doing what they came here to do: staring at Slughorn’s house in their magically concealed hire car, waiting for Slughorn to leave.

“Do you remember that conversation we had in the broom cupboard?” she whispers. “When I asked why that conversation with Slughorn was enough to break your trust, and you said you would tell me later?”

He glances at her, gaze darting down to her lips so quickly, she almost misses it. 

“Yes,” he says.

“Is it too late for me to ask you to elaborate?”

He goes quiet for a moment. “I hardly think that is necessary, given what you know.”

“It is necessary if you really think I ever would have told anyone. If you think I would have _trapped—_ ”

“I don’t,” he says. 

He is looking at her now, searching her face in the semidarkness. The answer—the quick, knee-jerk delivery of it—takes her aback.

She wants to ask him why he kissed her at Slughorn’s party. Because he missed her? Because he missed fucking her? Because they were in a broom cupboard the first time they kissed, and he did it out of habit? 

Because he saw her Patronus?

Instead, she says, “Are you angry that I know?”

“I am… frustrated is perhaps the best word. I am aware it was not your fault, and I appreciate that you informed me. I would, however, have preferred to tell you myself.”

“Were you going to tell me yourself?”

Sighing, he turns his face back towards the windscreen. “Possibly.”

“Do you…”

His rich, deep chuckle makes her pause. 

“How many questions do you have for me?” he asks, tone bordering on affectionate. “I am not necessarily complaining, mind. I simply wish to prepare myself.”

“Only about twenty more. And what do you mean by not _necessarily_ complaining?”

“It rather depends what your questions are.”

“Is the selkie thing why you always kept your clothes on?”

“Yes.” He pauses, as if choosing his next words carefully. “I do not like to be separated from my cloak when I am not alone, so I keep my clothes on.”

“That’s understandable.”

Their combined breath has fogged the windows. Pressing her hand to the cold glass, Hermione sends a wandless spell flowing through her fingertips to clear it.

“I remain astonished that you wished to see me otherwise,” Severus says.

He cannot be serious. They were involved for months. Of course she wanted to see his body. 

Hermione purses her lips. Lavender is a bad influence. That, combined with an inappropriate urge to lighten the mood and make him laugh is her only explanation—her only excuse—for her next question. 

“Can I see you now?”

He raises an eyebrow. “You are meant to be looking at Slughorn’s house.”

“Yes, but I’ve seen _that_ before.”

“Hmm. I have seen many things before that I would like to see again.”

The way his voice dips lower reminds her of the way he sounded years ago when he told her, in exquisite detail, how he was going to draw out her pleasure until she begged to come. Pulse racing, Hermione tries to ignore the pleasant clench low in her abdomen.

Because she is a professional, she trains her omnioculars on Slughorn’s house. She does not climb over the centre console, straddle Severus’s lap, and show him things he has seen before.

“I don’t think he’s going anywhere after all,” Hermione says after too long spent watching Slughorn sit by his fireplace and read. She hates this part of the job—the waiting, when each passing second feels as if she is wading through treacle.

“I agree,” Severus says. “Are you certain we cannot simply bind, gag, and Obliviate him?”

“Of course we can’t. Think of his poor elf.”

“Ah.” Lowering his own omnioculars, Severus rubs his temple. “Perhaps we could recruit one of my former colleagues for assistance. Someone trustworthy, whom Slughorn likes. Not Minerva; she always puts him on his guard.”

That twisting knife that Hermione felt in her gut at St Mungo’s returns. She tries to sound natural and casual when she says, “Septima, perhaps?”

Severus snorts. “I think not. Septima has many talents, but subtlety is not among them. We may as well ask Gilderoy Lockhart.”

 _She has many talents_. There is that knife again. Hermione tries to shove the feeling down, lock it in a box. It is ridiculous. She is ridiculous. Severus is free to admire the talents of whomever he chooses.

“Well,” she says, “I imagine Slughorn adored Lockhart before Lockhart was revealed as a fraud.”

“Gods, you’re right.” Covering his mouth to hide a yawn, Severus shakes his head. “A conversation between the two of them does not bear contemplating.”

There’s something about his voice when he gets sleepy. His accent shifts, takes on the barest hint of his mother’s Scottish burr. Hermione never noticed it when they were together. 

She echoes his yawn. She could doze off here, if she let herself. The car is warm and quiet, save the gentle rhythm of Severus’s breath.

They last for another hour before giving up, returning the hire car and going home. After the energy it takes to Apparate, Hermione strips off her clothes as she drags her feet towards her bedroom. She’ll pick them up tomorrow. A charm isn’t as satisfying as a toothbrush, but she makes an exception for tonight. All she cares about is crawling into bed.

The sheets are cold against her bare skin, but a charm solves that, too. She hovers on the edge of too exhausted to sleep. Closing her eyes and breathing deeply, a startling realisation jolts through her.

When she asked Severus if she could see him naked, he never said no.

* * *

Crouching down next to Hermione, Severus unrolls the Extendable Ear. From inside the house there are only shuffling sounds: Belby, presumably getting ready for his appointment with the mysterious A. 

Their position requires turning his back on the lake, which makes Severus’s skin crawl. Something about it is still _off_. It feels like no water he has ever encountered before.

Belby proves more cooperative than Slughorn. He does not announce his destination into the floo, as they hoped, but he does actually leave. The tracking spell Hermione placed on him makes a pinpoint of light mark his location on her charmed map.

“Devon,” she says. “Well.”

She takes Severus Side-Along to an alley not far from where Belby landed. By the time they catch up to him, a car has pulled to the side of the road. It is hard to say in the dark, but it looks like the same model as the car Severus and Hermione once followed to a coffee shop. The interior light jumps to life as Belby opens the passenger side door, confirming Severus’s suspicions. 

Audrey.

“Shite,” Hermione says, shaking her map. The glowing dot flickers. “The tracking spell is wearing off. We’re going to lose them.” She gives Severus a speculative look. “Do you think you can lift me and fly at the same time?”

He does not mention any of the times he picked her up and braced her back against a door or a bookcase while she wrapped her legs around him. The lift of his eyebrows does it for him.

“You wish me to attempt broomless flight through a populated Muggle area?” he asks. “Did Potter and Weasley put you up to this? Perhaps they wish to get revenge for the time I lectured them for taking a flying car from London to Scotland?”

“We’d be Disillusioned. _Obviously_.”

“And you would neither scream nor wrap your arms too tightly around my neck, because your intense fear of heights has miraculously vanished?” He shakes his head. “Let’s go back to Belby’s. We know he is occupied, and with whom, and there is something I would like to investigate.”

Hermione grumbles, but takes his arm when it’s offered. Back in Yorkshire, he leads her to the water’s edge.

“What do you want to investigate here?” she asks.

“If you tell Miss Brown I ever said anything so illogical, I will deny having this conversation,” he says, “but the water feels _wrong_ to me.”

“Really? Is that a power of yours or something?” She squints at the dark lake. “It seems completely normal to me.” 

Before he can stop her, she bends over and plunges her hand into the lake. When she brings it up again, cupping her fingers to catch the water, her skin is dry.

“It’s fake,” she says, attempting to splash water towards him and not creating so much as a ripple on the surface. “An illusion. That’d explain why it feels wrong.”

“Yes, I imagine so.”

Shrugging her shoulders, Hermione steps into the lake. And the water isn’t real, but seeing her standing in it and beckoning to him in the moonlight stirs up memories of a fantasy he once had of swimming with her. Not in Britain, but some indistinct, tropical place—deserted enough for them to shed their clothes and dive into warm water, where he could kiss her beneath the waves. Because it was a fantasy, he always left his cloak on the shore.

“Are you certain the whole thing is an illusion?” he asks.

“No,” she says. Her wand is out—she waves it in a few complicated arcs. “Just this little section of it. He’s created dams of some sort over there. Well, the Muggles would notice if the whole lake wasn’t actually full of water, wouldn’t they?”

“And if it’s charmed to suddenly become very real at the presence of intruders?”

“You can get us out of it, I’m sure.” A half smile accompanies another shrug. “I have a feeling you’re a pretty strong swimmer. Come on. We don’t know how much time we have.”

Severus follows her, wading farther into the illusion until they are submerged in it. The spell holds. Overhead, a sky full of stars ripples and wavers as if viewed through water. The dams Hermione mentioned are walls of magically reinforced stone, protecting a little windowless shed with wards so powerful, they make Severus’s magic tingle in his wand hand.

“Technically this is Muggle land, since it’s part of the lake,” Hermione says. “Let’s find out what he’s hiding.”

They join forces to dismantle the wards—the first time they have ever cast such complex magic together. Hermione’s magic reminds him of his otter Patronus: bright and safe and warm. Protective. As she moves closer to his side, he feels her shiver. A final surge of her magic, and the wards collapse.

Hermione takes a shuddering breath. “I…”

Whatever she intends to say is banished with a slight shake of her head. Opening the door, she marches into the shed.

Shelves of unlabelled boxes line the walls. It looks like a particularly neat stationery cupboard. Hermione selects a box and opens it, her eyes widening.

“Am I wrong, or is that a rather prominent member of the Wizengamot?” she asks, holding up a photograph of a couple caught in a passionate kiss.

“You are not wrong,” Severus says, “but that is not her husband.”

The other boxes contain similar items: incriminating pictures and letters that certain people would not wish to see fall into the wrong hands. As Severus takes a box down from the top shelf, its contents rattle together.

He is not prepared for the weight in his chest at the sight of the familiar Puddlemere United ring. Wood is not— _was_ not?—Severus’s friend. They are business partners. There is no reason this discovery should press down on him like grief.

And oh, Merlin. It is not the only thing in the box.

“Severus?” Hermione says. “Did you find something?”

He is seized by an irrational urge to hide it from her. Tuck it away in his pocket as if he can protect her from the pain this will cause. As if he can prevent it from happening in the first place. She looks up at him, brown eyes wide and trusting, and he almost gives in to the ridiculous impulse.

She needs to know, but how can he tell her?

“Yes,” he says, trying to gentle his voice, as if that makes any difference at all. As if it will soften the blow. “Percy Weasley’s glasses.”


	15. Chapter 15

_Previously:_

_“Severus?” Hermione says. “Did you find something?”_

_He is seized by an irrational urge to hide it from her. Tuck it away in his pocket as if he can protect her from the pain this will cause. As if he can prevent it from happening in the first place. She looks up at him, brown eyes wide and trusting, and he almost gives in to the ridiculous impulse._

_She needs to know, but how can he tell her?_

_“Yes,” he says, trying to gentle his voice, as if that makes any difference at all. As if it will soften the blow. “Percy Weasley’s glasses.”_

* * *

He’s right. They are Percy’s glasses. Those are his initials engraved on the interior of the left arm. And that has to be Oliver’s ring next to it. God.

Hermione’s fingertips brush Severus’s as she takes the glasses from the box. She has been trying to swallow her feelings about Percy’s likely death for so long, it feels as if she is frozen at the moment before impact. Any second now, this is going to shatter something within her, let everything out.

The last time she saw these glasses, they were on a drunk, laughing Percy. The memory is fuzzy and hard to grasp—fleeting snapshots of his smile, his bright blue eyes. It fades to black in the orchard, where sleep pulled her under.

Who is behind all of this? Audrey has been brewing poison. Slughorn and Belby are all tangled up in something to do with Amortentia, and Belby has been meeting Audrey. Percy used to make a living catching smugglers of illegal magical items—which includes several of the ingredients for Amortentia. Which sounds rather more glamourous than it was. Mostly, from what Hermione could gather, it involved a lot of paperwork and inspection of incoming shipments. There’s something just out of reach that she should be able to piece together, if she tries hard enough. If she is clever enough.

Why was Audrey so afraid when Hermione and Severus followed her to that coffee shop? And how does Oliver factor into it? He was friends with Percy and Audrey, but beyond that? He was also Severus’s business partner. Severus. Hermione looks up at him. He and Oliver weren’t close, but adding another name to the list of people he has lost cannot be easy. 

Maybe Oliver found out about the Amortentia, via Audrey. And then what? Maybe he confronted Slughorn or Belby, in typical outraged Gryffindor fashion. Or maybe his fierce need to win reared its head, and he demanded to be let in on it, rather that lose out on potentially lucrative profits to a competitor.

Maybe Hermione should stop speculating about all of it until she is somewhere safe.

“We have to get Harry,” she says. “Before Belby gets back and works out that we’ve found… whatever this is.”

They put everything back just as they found it: boxes stacked just so, wards sealed up tight. Hermione has to force her fingers to unclench from around the glasses. It’s silly, but she doesn’t want to leave them here. It feels like leaving Percy himself. Letting him get lost all over again.

As they emerge from the illusory lake, a light flickers on inside the house. Grabbing Severus’s arm, Hermione turns on the spot and thinks of Grimmauld Place.

* * *

Potter is asleep on the sofa in the drawing room: glasses still on, an open file of casework resting on his chest. He jolts upright at the sound of Hermione saying his name.

“Sorry to barge in,” she says. “We need your help.”

Potter springs into action before Hermione finishes telling him what they found, locking his case file in a drawer with wards that make Belby’s look like child’s play.

“Could you watch the kids while I look into it?” he asks. Glancing at Severus, he adds, “Err. Both of you, if you want, though you don’t have to stay if you’d rather not, sir.”

“Well, you know what a knack I have with children,” Severus says dryly. 

Ruffling his ever-messy hair, Potter snorts. “Yeah. They’re asleep, so they shouldn’t be any trouble. Probably. Maybe.”

Severus has known Potter’s children since they were infants, when they still had the surnames Jugson and Avery. Single father of war orphans is not what Severus would have predicted for Potter. Married at an obscenely early age to one of his many admirers would have been Severus’s guess.

Thank Merlin he won’t have to teach this generation of Potters. 

After Potter leaves, Hermione sinks down on the sofa. How many times did they sit there together at Order parties? Never _too_ close, but close enough for her to reach out and touch his arm, give him a significant look.

“The way I see it,” she says, “there are two likely explanations. One: Belby is a serial killer, and those are his trophies. Two: he’s keeping that stuff to blackmail someone.” Her eyes widen. “Or frame someone. Remember how Zacharias Smith told me he thought you were responsible for Oliver’s disappearance? And Ron told Lavender there were similar rumours going around the Ministry about you. The contents of the other boxes would suggest the blackmail or framing thing.”

Sitting next to her—not too close—Severus nods. “I agree. The next question, I suppose, is the identity of his potential blackmail victim. Or victims.”

“Slughorn? Audrey?” Rubbing her forehead, she slumps forward. “Those are my only guesses. I don’t know. I’ve been chasing Percy’s disappearance so long, it’s hard to see the forest for the trees at this point. Given the Amortentia at Slughorn’s, I think it must have something to do with Percy’s job. It has to.”

Severus expects her to Floo Miss Brown in spite of the late hour and ask her to fetch an obscene number of files. To drown herself in work until it buries every emotion except determination. Instead, she looks up at him, her chin trembling.

“This doesn’t feel real,” she whispers. “I keep waiting for… I don’t know. Maybe it won’t really hit me until we know for certain that Percy is dead. Because he has to be, doesn’t he?”

It’s not truly a question, but Severus answers anyway. “It does seem likely.” 

He wants to sweep the words away, to claim it’s more likely that Weasley and Wood are being kept somewhere, but it won’t work. It won’t help her.

“I can’t stop going over the night he disappeared,” she says. “You’d think after five years, I would start to accept it. The inevitable, I mean. I don’t know. We weren’t even close, but I was the last one to see him.” Tucking her legs under her body places her closer to Severus—almost within range of resting her head on his shoulder. “I still look for him every time I see a tall, lanky man with ginger hair. I still wonder if I could have helped him if I’d been conscious. Would I at least know what happened to him?” 

This is pointless. She will drive herself mad going over all of the ways she could have done things differently. Severus should know.

She sniffles, and Severus is taken back eight years, to a rainy afternoon in early May. After the annual memorial service, tearstains still on her cheeks, she grabbed his arm and led him into one of the spare rooms of this house. 

It was the first time she tried to see him naked.

Catching her wandering hands as her fingers toyed with his top button, he said. “My robes stay on. But if you have any other requests, I’m sure I can oblige.”

“I just want to feel something else,” she whispered.

That, Severus could do. He let himself get lost in the taste and heat of her—in the slight sting of her fingers twisting in his hair as he moved his mouth between her legs. Her voice climbed higher as her breaths came faster, and everything outside of that room vanished. There was only Hermione—her pleasure, her gasps as she came undone. 

Now, a fully clothed Hermione dashes the tears from her face with the back of her hand and lets out a jagged sigh.

“I’m sorry,” she says. “I haven’t even asked how you’re doing. Are you all right?”

“Me?” Severus says. “Yes.”

“I saw Oliver’s ring in the box. All evidence points to you losing your business partner for good. Are you sure you’re okay?”

Such a simple, ordinary question. There is no reason it should cause a sudden swell of Patronus-bright warmth in his chest. And yet, here he is: quelling an inappropriate urge to kiss her.

“I am certain, thank you,” he says.

When she sniffles again, he lets his hand fall to the cushion so it almost rests on hers. This seems to be the wrong response, because a sob fills the air between them, sounding as if it is wrenched from her. Severus doesn’t know how to comfort her and make it stop. He only knows that every time her shoulders shake with another burst of tears, it causes a corresponding ache behind his sternum. Moving his hand to her shoulder is treated as an invitation: Hermione shifts closer and wraps her arms around him.

It feels strangely intimate, even after all they’ve done together, to return the embrace. Almost like another first. Sagging against him, she presses her cheek to the scar on his neck. Her grip on him tightens, like she thinks he might vanish. Like he might succumb to Nagini’s venom after all. 

“I’m sorry,” she says in a wobbly voice. “I don’t normally cry all over clients, I swear.”

“Do you normally ask to see them naked?”

Her laugh is tear-choked, but genuine. “Definitely not.” Pulling away from him, she grabs a tissue from a box on a side table. “I guess you’re just a special case. You never did answer me, though.”

Severus quirks an eyebrow. “Did I not?” he asks, even though the thought of removing his robes around her—around anyone—still chills his blood. “Interesting.”

Her blushing smile feels like some sort of victory.

They sink into silence, broken only by Hermione’s occasional sniffles as she calms. The sort of silence they used to have when they sat and read together. Potter returns earlier than Severus expects, having put some subordinates in charge of paperwork after he brought Belby in.

“He isn’t talking,” Potter says. “We’ll let him stew for a while, then Ron and I will try good cop, bad cop in the morning. We’ll get your statements taken care of then. I have Aurors watching Slughorn and Audrey, and it doesn’t seem like Belby was able to alert either of them before we got him. I’ll bring them in for questioning tomorrow, too.” He looks at Hermione’s face—at the clear evidence of her recent tears—and tilts his head to one side. “Everything okay here?”

“Yeah,” Hermione says. “Just… you know. Processing what this probably means for Percy. Or attempting to.”

Potter’s suspicious expression softens, and Severus almost sees his lost friend in that look instead of his childhood bully. 

“As you no longer require my unpaid childcare, Potter, I will be off,” Severus says, standing up. 

“I’ll Floo you in the morning,” Hermione says, and Potter’s head tilt returns.

On his way down the stairs, Severus hears Potter ask, “How did you work out the lake was an illusion, by the way?”

Severus freezes.

“Oh, I tripped and stuck my foot in it,” Hermione says without missing a beat, as if she has the story ready. She makes it sound like the truth. “My foot stayed dry, so we investigated.”

Potter mentioned statements. Hermione intends to lie on hers?

Hermione and Potter keep talking, but Severus continues down the stairs and Apparates home.


	16. Chapter 16

_Previously: It feels strangely intimate, even after all they’ve done together, to return the embrace. Almost like another first. Sagging against him, she presses her cheek to the scar on his neck. Her grip on him tightens, like she thinks he might vanish. Like he might succumb to Nagini’s venom after all._

* * *

The room Harry and Ron lead them to thrums with magic. It slides down the back of Hermione’s neck, buzzes in her ear. Harry has never let her watch the interrogations that resulted from any of her other cases, but he was the one who made the suggestion. This one is different.

“They won’t be able to see or hear you,” Harry says. “And neither will we, so if you think of something we should ask, it won’t do you any good to shout at us for being dunderheads. We’ll check in with you in a bit, anyway.” Taking out a Galleon, he turns to Ron. “Head or tails, mate?”

Ron shakes his head, his mouth forming a flat line. “Neither.” To Severus and Hermione, he says, “We usually flip for who has to be the bad cop, but I don’t reckon I can convincingly play good cop this time.”

Harry gives him an awkward pat on the shoulder, and they leave Hermione and Severus there. 

With the door shut, the room is so dark, she can barely see him. The wall in front of them looks like a Muggle film screen, showing Horace Slughorn sitting in an uncomfortable looking metal chair at a scuffed table.

“I’m not sure what I’ll do if Percy is actually found,” she says. “I spent so long looking for him.”

Severus’s robes rustle as he shifts in his chair. Is he looking at her? In the dark, she can’t quite tell. 

“I spent nearly a decade trying to help my mother,” he says. “When I finally managed it, I felt rather lost. Like I no longer had a purpose.”

Help his mother. Find her stolen cloak, set her free.

“What did you do?” she asks.

“I made a colossal mistake, then spent the better part of the next twenty years attempting to atone for it,” he says. “I do not recommend that course of action.”

“I should hope not.”

“You have far more sense than I did. Do you enjoy your work, overall?” 

“I do. Especially cases like Màiri’s.”

His elbow presses against hers. “Then you will continue.” 

Before Hermione can think of a reply, Harry and Ron appear on the screen in front of them.

“Hello, Professor,” Harry says. His entire demeanour has shifted to the boy wizard Hermione remembers from their school days. He has even made his hair messier.

“Harry,” Slughorn says, “There seems to have been a misunderstanding.”

“Yeah,” Ron says. “It seems you misunderstood the fact that love potions are illegal. Care to explain?”

“Goodness,” Slughorn says, “I think the last time I brewed Amortentia, it was for a lesson—when both of you were still my students.”

“Really?” Ron asks. “We have Belby in another room. He’s been here since last night. He might start feeling chatty soon. Do you think he’ll tell the same story?”

There. A flinch. Severus must catch it too; he goes very still.

“Do you think Belby will have anything to tell us about Oliver Wood?” Ron asks.

“Wood? I only met him in passing. Terrible business, him going missing.”

It goes on like this for some time: Ron demanding answers, Slughorn evading, until Ron steps out of the room, claiming he needs a coffee. Instead of going to the Aurors’ break room, Ron joins Hermione and Severus to watch the show.

“Ugh,” Ron says. “Remember how excited Slughorn was to show our class Amortentia, Hermione? Merlin, I bloody hate love potions. Being under one… The obsession is just…” He shudders. “It’s even worse when it wears off. I can’t even describe how… And I was _lucky_. Did you do the whole Amortentia display when you taught Potions, Snape?”

“No. I somehow thought it a bad idea to demonstrate the brewing of love potions to a group of hormone-addled teenagers. I taught the brewing of antidotes.”

“Sir,” Harry says, voice low and pleading. “If you actually brewed Amortentia, you could be in a lot of trouble. If you come clean, you might be able to work out a plea bargain.”

Slughorn sighs. “I cannot arrange a plea bargain for a crime I didn’t commit. And since Ronald brought up Oliver Wood… Well. You know I’m not the type to spread rumours, Harry.” He opens his mouth, teetering on the edge of speech for a moment before continuing. “I think you should look into Severus Snape.”

“Does he actually expect us to believe that?” Ron asks. “As if you would get caught.”

Severus snorts. 

Harry barely reacts. It is only because Hermione knows him so well that she spots the slight narrowing of his eyes.

“Why do you say that?” Harry asks.

Slughorn puts on a regretful expression. “No one stood to gain more from Oliver’s disappearance than Severus.”

The exact line of reasoning that Zacharias Smith used. Hermione’s fingernails dig into her palms. Heat floods her face, burning up to the tips of her ears. 

“You may think you know him,” Slughorn says gently, “but believe me, you don’t.”

“If Slughorn keeps this up,” Hermione says, “I will cast a Silencio so powerful, he will swallow his own tongue.”

Severus goes very still.

Ron laughs. “I’d rather you didn’t. Too much paperwork.”

“Sir?” a woman in Auror robes says, sticking her head into the room. “I’m sorry to bother you, but Belby is acting a little strange. He stumbled around a bit, like he was snapping out of a trance. And now he’s… Well, erm.”

“He’s what?” Ron asks.

“He just keeps saying _that bitch_ over and over.”

Hermione frowns. Snapping out of a trance? Could he have been under an Imperius? But who might he mean by _that bitch_?

* * *

Severus stands at the sink in one of the Ministry’s loos, running cold water over his wrists to cool his blood. He longs for the chill of the North Sea. 

As he nears the door, he hears a familiar voice in the hall: Miss Brown’s strident Essex accent.

“—here too?”

“He is, yeah,” Hermione says.

“That’s good.” Her voice lowers, and Severus has to crack the door open to catch the rest. “I’ve been wondering something. You two… There’s this… Err.”

“There’s what?” Hermione asks.

“Well, sometimes I am tempted to ask if you want me to leave the office so you can get naked and let him bend you over the nearest available flat surface.”

The noise Hermione makes is somewhere between a laugh and a groan. 

“Have you already?” Miss Brown asks. “What was it like? Was it really intense? It seems like it’d be really intense. Did you use my desk? Friends don’t shag on friends’ desks without telling them all of the details. And cleaning it thoroughly.”

Another laugh-groan. “We haven’t got naked, Lav.”

Technically true, as she is speaking of both of them. Nor has he bent her over any flat surfaces. Recently.

Miss Brown huffs. “Well, Merlin, what’s stopping you? Don’t you know you’re supposed to have exciting affairs so your boring old married friends can live vicariously through you?”

This time, Hermione chuckles. “You are neither old, nor married.”

“May as well be. I came here with a bacon sandwich in my pocket for Ron. I reckon today is going to be hard for him.”

“Okay, that is actually really sweet, Lav. Unless that’s some sort of innuendo.”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Severus can practically hear Miss Brown’s eyebrow waggle. “Anyway, are you hesitating because Snape used to be your teacher? Who cares? He can give you a naughty detention now. You’re both adults.” After a pause, Miss Brown’s voice gentles. “Or are you hesitating because you have actual feelings for him? More than just sexy feelings?” 

No response. Does Hermione shake her head? Nod? Gape at Miss Brown as if she has taken leave of her senses?

“Well,” Miss Brown says, “I think that’s wonderful. But hey, you still have to tell me about all of your naughty detention fun if you fall in love with him.”

_Fall in love with him._

“I don’t see why that would make it any less likely,” Hermione says. “You tell me about yours.”

“I’m not in love with Ronald.”

“There is a bacon sandwich in your pocket that says otherwise.”

Severus can’t go out there now. They will know he was listening. Fortunately, Ronald shows up, accepting Miss Brown’s bacon sandwich offering and leading them away. Severus has to go back to the sink—back to the cold water—breathing strength into his Occlumency shields before he is settled enough to rejoin the group.

Audrey’s interrogation is next. Belby is still being uncooperative, ranting about _that bitch_. Miss Brown stays with them, settling herself into the chair on the end of the row and attempting to subtly nudge the middle chair away from her, so it’s closer to the other one. Hermione laughs under her breath. Neither of them alter Miss Brown’s positioning of the chairs, so when Hermione and Severus sit next to each other, he can feel the warmth of her against his side, can smell the familiar citrusy notes of her perfume. The door closes, cloaking the room in darkness.

Audrey looks up when Potter and Ronald appear on the screen. Only Potter returns her murmured greeting. 

“Do you want to tell us what you actually know about Percy’s disappearance?” Ronald asks.

Sitting up straight, Audrey exhales a long breath. “Percy and Oliver are dead, and Horace Slughorn is responsible,” she says. “But I didn’t know that until fairly recently.”

Bile burns the back of Severus’s throat. Hermione’s hand slides over his clenched fist. He turns his palm upwards, opening his hand so her fingers can lace together with his.

“You’re certain?” Potter asks. “Will you take Veritaserum to back up your claims? It’s a potion that—”

“I know what Veritaserum is, Harry. Percy taught me all about your world.”

“You have the right to say no, but it’ll help us out a lot,” Potter says. “It’s inadmissable as evidence when taken by magical people, since some of us can resist the effects with Occlumency, but it always works on Muggles.”

She hesitates, chewing on her thumbnail. Severus leans forward in his chair.

“I think she doesn’t want to tell them why she’s been brewing poison,” Hermione says. “Do you think she meant to use it on them? Belby and Slughorn, I mean. If she found out fairly recently that they killed her husband…”

“Perhaps,” Severus says.

“And maybe she’s the one Belby has been ranting about. The junior Auror said Belby behaved as if he was coming out of a trance. A potion, maybe? She knows enough about them.”

“All right,” Audrey finally says, and a vial of clear liquid is retrieved by an underling. Audrey swigs the contents, her eyes going blank.

“Who killed Percy Weasley and Oliver Wood?” Potter asks.

“Someone hired by Horace Slughorn,” Audrey says, her voice flat.

“How do you know?” Ronald asks.

“Marcus Belby. I told him I wanted to meet up last night to discuss providing potions to some of my wizarding patients, then I dosed him with one of his own love potions. He was willing to tell me almost anything after that.”

“Oh,” Hermione breathes. 

“Good for her,” Miss Brown says. “It serves him right.”

“Err,” Potter says. “Did you tell him to keep quiet, by any chance?”

“I told him to keep his mouth shut and not to tell anyone about me. I also said he shouldn’t go through with Slughorn’s plan to plant evidence on Severus Snape.”

Ronald glances towards the charmed wall, raising his eyebrows.

“I would have liked to see them try,” Hermione mutters.

“Likewise,” Severus says. “But how did she know to approach Marcus Belby, of all people?”

Potter, in a shocking show of competence, makes this his very next question.

“I knew because of Oliver,” Audrey says. “Marcus asked if Oliver was interested in joining Slughorn’s business. Oliver told me all about it—how they were distributing illegal love potions. He said he was going to expose them. I never saw him again after that.”

Would they have asked Wood to join them if he was not in the potions business? 

“And Percy?” Ronald asks.

“Marcus said Percy made the mistake of being good at his job. Percy knew someone in his department was smuggling illegal ingredients. He got close to catching them before he was drugged at that Order Christmas party and taken.”

The night Percy and Hermione got fall-down drunk on very little firewhisky, when she lay down in the orchard and woke up to find Percy vanished. Severus squeezes her hand.

“Why didn’t you bring this to me?” Ronald asks. “Or Harry. Or my mum and dad. Or almost anyone else you know in the magical world? You can’t defend yourself against someone with a wand.”

“I could defend myself. I brewed a powerful poison and kept a syringe of it in my handbag, just in case. I didn’t want to risk any of you getting hurt. I thought they wouldn’t suspect me, since I’m a Muggle. After Lavender started visiting me I thought about going to Hermione, since she’s a private investigator, but I didn’t think she would want to work for me after I was so cold to her when Percy went missing. I wanted evidence before I came to you. I didn’t want them to get away with it.”

“Did you find that evidence?” Potter asks.

“Not yet. Marcus told me where to find them. Where to find Percy and Oliver’s bodies.”

* * *

Percy shifts forever to past tense beneath a clear blue sky, as his siblings place his casket on a stone table next to Fred’s grave. Hermione sits in the back row of chairs, far from Harry, Lavender, and the Weasleys. This day is hard enough for Molly; Hermione doesn’t want to make it worse.

The chair next to her creaks, dark robes swooping into her peripheral vision. She knows before she turns her head that it’s Severus.

He doesn’t say anything. He is simply _there_ —a steady, comforting presence at her side as Bill delivers the eulogy, as Ron turns his face towards Lavender so no one else will see him cry, as bright white lights surround the casket and lower it into the earth.

Hermione’s eyes remain dry. She already said goodbye in the drawing room at Grimmauld Place. This is only a formality, because Percy loved formalities.

“Do you want to go in?” Severus asks as everyone else stands and starts proceeding towards the house. 

Hermione shakes her head. “I already gave my condolences to Audrey and Ron and everyone else who will want to hear them. I am still not Molly’s favourite person.”

“Mm. She always did have abysmal taste.” 

Hermione’s heart gives a dangerous little flutter. She finally turns to face him, expecting to find that familiar smirk on his lips, but he stares straight ahead, frowning slightly. 

If she says goodbye now and they go their separate ways, will it be another eight years before she sees him again? The thought of never again kissing him, touching him, laughing with him makes her stomach sink. She can’t let that happen.

“Could we go somewhere and talk?” she asks, touching his arm. “Yours, maybe?”

His dark eyes meet hers. “Yes.”


	17. Chapter 17

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I owe a huge amount of thanks to Vitellia, Morbidmuch, and Mersheeple. They are the best beta and alpha readers I could ever ask for. And I never would have come up with the plot of this fic if not for repeatedly talking with Viridiantly about how we both thought selkie!Snape should be a more common trope.
> 
> And thank you all, as always, for reading. 💗

_Previously: “Could we go somewhere and talk?” she asks, touching his arm. “Yours, maybe?”_

_His dark eyes meet hers. “Yes.”_

* * *

When Hermione and Severus land in his garden, they are not alone. A pair of dark-haired figures wait by the back door: Eileen and Màiri.

“Fuck,” Severus mutters. “Give me a moment. I will get rid of the interlopers.”

Hermione laughs. “Severus! I can wait.”

“Well, I bloody can’t.” In a louder voice, he adds, “Mum. Màiri. What brings you here?”

“Just visiting you,” Màiri says. 

Hermione squeezes Severus’s hand, and he does let them in, but scowls as he does so. 

It doesn’t take long for Hermione to wish she’d taken Severus up on his offer. In an effort to make conversation, Màiri lands on the topic of Severus’s case. Hermione wants to have a long overdue talk with Severus, not rehash the details about how she was there, unconscious, when Percy was drugged and taken. Perched on his sofa, sipping a cup of tea, she tries to steer the conversation towards the verdict.

“Slughorn tried to sell everyone else out, in the end,” she says. “He tried very hard to get himself a shorter prison sentence, but he’ll be there for the rest of his life.”

“Good.” Màiri sneers. “I never did like him. How on earth did they intend to plant evidence on Severus?”

“Via one of my former colleagues,” Severus says.

Eileen blinks. “ _Another_ one?”

“Yes. Septima Vector. They intended to have her sneak the evidence into my home, though they hadn’t got much further in their plan than spreading rumours and trying to make people doubt me. Septima was among those Slughorn sold out—part of their potions ring, apparently. She ran into us at St Mungo’s by chance and attempted to seize the opportunity. How fortunate I never even considered Floo-calling her.”

Hermione brings her mug up to her mouth to hide a smile.

Eileen sniffs. “You can’t trust anyone.”

Severus gives Hermione an inscrutable look.

“I don’t think that’s true,” Màiri says.

“Really?” Eileen says, eyebrow arching in a very familiar way. “ _You_ don’t think so?”

When Eileen’s gaze darts towards Hermione, Severus says, simply, “She knows.”

Eileen sighs.

“It’s too bleak to consider the alternative,” Màiri says. “And look at that Muggle woman—Audrey? She put herself in serious danger to find the people responsible for the deaths of her husband and her friend. I think it’s safe to say Percy and Oliver could have trusted her.” Turning to Hermione, she adds, “Will anything happen to her? Audrey?”

“She’s had her potions texts confiscated,” Hermione says, “and she’ll land in serious trouble if she brews again. I reckon she thinks it was worth it.”

Eileen and Màiri fall into a conversation about one of Màiri’s siblings, who has just married a Muggle woman. Eileen thinks it is doomed to failure—that Màiri’s sibling will be trapped as surely as Màiri was. Severus remains silent through it all, pacing slowly in front of his bookshelves as if searching for something. 

Hermione’s heart won’t stop racing. She clasps her hands on her lap, lacing her fingers together to stop them from trembling. _When_ will they leave?

“You can’t trust anyone—Muggle or wizard—to love you enough,” Eileen says. “You can’t trust them to trust you. They all get insecure and suspicious eventually. No one’s love is deep enough to avoid it.”

“No one’s infatuation is deep enough, maybe,” Hermione says. “No one who truly loved someone—every part of them—would trap them.”

“Exactly,” Màiri says. “And those are the only stories of ours that get told. They all talk about fishermen who are enraptured by a selkie at first sight. That’s not love. There is nothing wrong with being alone, if that’s what makes you happy, but your way isn’t the only way.”

Hermione misses Màiri’s next words. She is too absorbed in the sight of Severus plucking a crimson, cloth-bound book from the shelf. Leafing through it to a spot near the end, he runs his wand over a section of the page. What on earth is he doing?

Scooping up one of the empty mugs with his free hand, Severus drops the book into Hermione’s lap and stalks off towards the kitchen. Her fingers trace the gilt lettering on the cover. 

_Persuasion_ by Jane Austen.

Màiri and Eileen are still engrossed in their debate, so Hermione flips through the pages until she finds the passage that Severus highlighted. The letters shimmer a deep blue, wavering as if floating on the surface of a calm sea.

_I can listen no longer in silence. I must speak to you by such means as are within my reach. You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope. Tell me not that I am too late, that such precious feelings are gone for ever. I offer myself to you again with a heart even more your own than when you almost broke it, eight years and a half ago._

She can’t breathe. If she breathes, the tears stinging her eyes will overflow. 

Tucking the book under her arm, she takes her half-full mug into the kitchen. Severus stands at the window, his hands resting on the worktop.

“You did once say I was the Captain Wentworth to your Anne Elliot,” he says.

She lets out a watery laugh. “I did.”

She cannot wait a second longer. Setting the mug and book down, she crosses to him in a few quick strides, flying at him the instant he turns to face her. He catches her, his arms wrapping tightly around her waist. Easy—like it always used to be.

“I think you’ll find,” she says, sniffling, “that you also broke my heart eight years ago.”

He scoffs against her neck. “Are you always going to be such a pedant?”

“Yes.”

“Good.”

Cradling her face in his hands, Severus brushes his thumbs over her cheeks. She can’t say which of them moves first. It’s as gradual as the tide, as if they have all the time in the world. As if it’s the first time. 

When their lips finally touch, it is nothing like the first time. The softness of his thin lips, the slight taste of tea on his tongue, the warmth of his breath on her cheek—all of it is so _familiar_. It’s like coming home. 

Slow, gentle kisses build to a crescendo, until he has her backed against the worktop, his leg pressing between her thighs. Hermione swallows a moan.

“Severus,” she murmurs. “Your mum and cousin are still in the other room.”

“They are, regrettably. One moment.”

Keeping his hold on her, he spins on the spot. Darkness constricts around her. They land on uneven ground, stumbling slightly. Her gasp tumbles into a laugh as she realises where they are. The pebbled beach near her cottage.

“Are you seriously going to just leave them there?” she asks.

“Yes. Expecto Patronum.”

The creature that flows from his wand is too small and skinny to be a seal. It swims around him in a circle, playfully spinning onto its back. 

“Oh,” Hermione whispers. One hand raises to her chest as she watches his otter Patronus dash south, carrying a message that he and Hermione were unexpectedly called away on business.

“Yes,” Severus says. “Well. I suppose it is only fair. I have seen yours.”

Hermione lets her gaze travel along the length of his body, a sharp twist of longing shooting through her abdomen. Grabbing his hand, she leads him towards the cottage.

The cats are on them the instant they cross the threshold. Crookshanks rubs against Severus’s legs, purring loudly.

“Not now, Crooks,” Hermione says. Between kisses, she drags Severus to her bedroom and shuts the door against any feline invaders.

Severus’s fingers fumble with the buttons of her black robes. “Yes?” he says. 

“Yes.”

What other answer could she possibly give? She helps him undress her, lending a hand with the clasp of her bra after the buttons have been conquered. Once she shimmies out of her knickers, she presses herself against the length of his body, relishing the familiar roughness of his robes on her bare skin.

She expects him to kiss a blazing path from her neck down to her chest. She expects a whispered question and long fingers seeking between her legs. Instead, his hands move to the top button of his own robes and pause there.

“You don’t have to,” she says. 

He shakes his head. “I would like to.” 

She sits on the edge of the bed, giving him space. Letting him decide. Stepping back, he looks at her naked body as if committing every curve to memory. As if he hasn’t seen it dozens of times before. _Hungry_. That is the only way to describe that look. 

Settling herself on the fluffy mountain of pillows, Hermione smiles up at him. He unfastens the first few buttons as she watches, revealing a triangle of pale skin she has never seen before. 

She wants to tell him how often she fantasised about this—how recently she thought about him naked in this very bed as she made herself come—but she can’t make her mouth form the words. Not when he’s still looking at her like that. 

Reaching the final button, he shrugs out of his robes and shirt. The instant the robes leave his body, they become a silvery grey cloak, spotted with black. It’s beautiful. _He_ is beautiful. 

Hermione has to rise up onto her knees and touch him, then—has to run her fingertips over the ridges of previously undiscovered scars, has to let her hand flirt with dipping beneath the waistband of his trousers. She brushes her lips over a scar below his belly button, and he makes an inarticulate sound. His skin is warm—softer than she imagined, apart from the ropey scars and sparse patches of dark hair.

Severus drapes the cloak over the headboard. Hermione barely notices. She is too busy kissing that scar, unbuckling his belt, shoving his trousers and pants down his legs. There is nothing between them now. 

Tugging him onto the bed by his wrists and pushing him onto his back (he needs no persuasion), she throws one leg over his waist. Something new mingles with that hungry look in his eyes as she leans forward, her breasts pressing against his chest. Hermione can’t put a name to that something else until he slides a hand up her neck and into her hair, pulling her down for a slow, sweet kiss. _Awe_.

Both of them gasp as she shifts her hips and grinds against his cock. He seems intent on making as much contact between them as possible. Like he can’t get enough of his skin on her skin. Kissing him, she keeps moving her hips, teasing them both, sliding against his length. 

“Fuck,” he breathes. Grabbing her arse, he arches up against her. “ _Hermione_.”

It sounds both like an admonishment and a plea. Either way, she is happy to give him what he wants. What they both want. It feels both familiar and brand new, positioning him at her entrance and holding his gaze as she lowers herself on him in one smooth, delicious stroke. She pauses there, savouring, like he always used to. He kisses her lips gently. Reverently. 

It is too much. She doesn’t know what to do with the almost unbearable fondness swirling in her chest. Brushing his hair back from his face, she cups his cheeks.

“Oh,” she whispers. “I missed you.”

He gives her that smile she remembers from eight years ago—the unguarded, warm one that made her think it wasn’t something she was supposed to witness. Now, it feels like something that is only for her. Something no one else is allowed to witness.

This isn’t one of their old, clandestine meetings. There is no one outside the door, no one expecting them to rejoin a gathering. They have time. She shifts up slowly, her breath catching at the same time as his as she slides back down.

“You feel…” he says. His eyes flutter shut on a moan.

Bracing her hands on his shoulders, Hermione moves faster. How did she go eight years without this? Without him gripping her hips and driving up into her like that? Tilting her head back, lost in sensation, she gasps out his name as he reaches between them and touches her. He still knows her body—can still tell when she’s close.

The rapid circling of his thumb, the feeling of him filling her again and again, the wonderful novelty of his skin against hers—all of it is too much. Too good. And then he makes that sound—the soft gasp followed by a long groan that he always makes when he comes—and Hermione topples over the edge. Bright waves of pleasure crest and overwhelm her.

As their breathing slows, she slumps forward, giving him a kiss that turns lazy and slow.

“We were supposed to talk,” she says.

He chuckles. “We were.”

“Your fault for seducing me.”

“Did I?”

“Yes. You seduced me with Austen.”

“Hmm. I regret nothing.”

“Good. Neither do I.”

Hermione shivers. She is still on top of him, soaking up his body heat, but the room is cold after being shut up all day without a fire. Reaching up to the headboard, Severus tugs his cloak down and spreads it over her. The soft fur feels like him—like his magic. Hermione swallows over the sudden lump of emotion in her throat.

“Have you ever done this before?” she asks, her voice trembling. At his arched eyebrow, she laughs. “Been totally naked with someone, I mean.”

“No. Never.”

“I’m honoured you could trust me that much.” She traces meaningless patterns on his chest. “We’ll have to do that, you know? Both of us. We’ll need to trust each other. If we want to make a proper go of things.”

“Really? I thought we would go back to fucking in broom cupboards at Order functions.”

She smirks. “Tempting, but no. This time, I want everyone to know we’re together.”

He gives her that warm smile again. “If that is how we are going to proceed, please inform Miss Brown that she is not, under any circumstances, to ask me about anything to do with _naughty detentions_.”

Hermione laughs.

* * *

_Two years later_

The sound of the sea wakes her. 

Hermione stretches beneath the knitted blanket—the one she made for Severus when he was in hospital after the war. She knows before she opens her eyes that the silvery cloak will be gone from its hook on the wall. Severus always covers her with the blanket and opens the window when he goes to sea, letting the salt air in to curl around her.

Swinging her legs out of bed, she shivers as her feet touch the chilly floorboards. Summer is drawing to a close. It’s never particularly warm up here, at what feels like the edge of the world.

The wind kicks up, knocking a wedding invitation from Ron and Lavender off of the bedside table. Hermione tucks it inside a well-thumbed copy of _Persuasion_ , near the bookmark that forever lives on a certain page. 

The cats trail after her as she pours milk over muesli and takes her breakfast out to the conservatory. Yawning, she sips her too-hot, giant-sized mug of coffee. The conservatory is still her favourite part of their tiny cottage. As she gazes out at the restless waves, a seal leaps above the water—a flash of dark grey, spotted with black.

Crookshanks hops onto the table. Pressing a paw against the window, he meows a protest at his favourite lap for a mid-morning snooze being absent.

“Come on, Crooks,” Hermione says, nudging him. “You know better than that.”

As he reluctantly obeys, a shaft of sunlight breaks through the clouds, shining on the distant seal. Hermione smiles to herself.

Severus will be home soon.


End file.
